One Hero Plus Three Sisters Equals Four Swords
by Krista
Summary: Zelda:FSA. Instead of copies of Link, 3 sisters were warped to Hyrule to help him defeat Vaati. One's like a mother hen, another is strong & stubborn, and the last is hyper and wild. Poor Link. ON HIATUS; check profile for updates.
1. Meet the Sisters!

**The One-and-Only Disclaimer: **No, unfortunately, I do not own any sort of idea behind the genius that is the Zelda series, nor do I own anything else in this story that you recognize as already being copyrighted. I do own my OCs, however, and ideas that are not part of the Zelda universe behind this story.

**Krista (author's note edited July 15th, 2009): **This story is based off of the Gamecube Four Swords Adventure game in the Legend of Zelda series. Please note that the first dozen chapters of this story are not the best examples of how well I write; they were written about five years ago. Once you get through the first dozen chapters, the writing will (or should) be much better. I am planning on rewriting the first dozen chapters when I can. Thank you, and enjoy the story!

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**Chapter One: Meet the sisters!**

"Patience! Quit hiding behind us and help us defeat the boss!" An annoyed girl deliberately made her blue Link throw a bomb at the purple one. She was seventeen, with light brown hair that reached just past her shoulders. After making sure her Link was safely out of the boss's reach, she turned her crystal blue eyes to glare at her little sister.

"You hurt my Link and made me lose force gems!" the younger one pouted. This girl's dirty blond, chest-length hair was coming out of its' pigtails. She pushed some of it out of her blue-gray eyes as she hurriedly made her purple Link gather his fallen force gems.

"Why are you always leaving us to do the fighting, Patience?" the elder sister asked.

"Err......I'm collecting more force gems just in case one of you die?" Patience said in a wayward attempt to get her oldest sister to believe her.

"I'm not buying that," blue Link's controller answered. "Where are you going to get more force gems? We're locked in this room, and you already destroyed all the vases." Patience looked down, trying to think of a comeback. "Besides, I see you over there playing with your fire rod. Why won't you fight?" Her youngest sister looked at her, eyes twinkling.

"Come on, Hope. I'm only eleven years old! You really want me to learn how to fight and play such violent video games?" she pleaded. Hope laughed at her little sister.

"Listen, girl, you play _way_ more violent games than Four Swords Adventures with--"

"DIE!!" Patience jumped and fell off the bed that she and Hope were sitting on, as Hope looked at the T.V. and saw the last remains of the boss blowing up. Then she glanced at her other younger sister as Patience, rubbing her head, glared at her other older sister. A few minutes after they started staring at her, the third girl smirked at them.

"What?" she asked innocently. "If you two aren't going to fight, don't think I'm going to wait for you." With that, she made her green and red Links hit the barrier of darkness and watched as another maiden emerged from her crystal prison. This girl was stuck in the middle of the family, being fourteen years old. Still mesmerized to the screen, she pushed her waist-length, dark brown hair out of her face as her same colored eyes read what the maiden was saying. When the maiden was done, she made the green Link walk toward one of the little warp squares on the ground with the red Link following. Since there were only three of them playing, she usually was two Links, being the sister that played video games the most and, thus, having the best idea of what she was doing.

"Uh, Faith?" Hope waved her hand in front of her sister's face. "You beat this game twice before on your own. Why are you hypnotized to the screen every time one of the six maidens talk?" Faith, who was sitting on the floor, looked up at her older sister.

"So I'll remember more of the important details better when you and Patience ask me questions like, 'What'd she say?', 'Where are we going?', or my personal favorite, 'What's going on?'" she answered. Patience stood up and started scratching the side of her head, confused.

"So, uh, what _is_ going on?"

"See?!" Faith threw her hands up in frustration. "Wehavetogotothelostwoodsnext!" she told her younger sibling, speaking so fast that she knew neither of her sisters would understand. Hope just arched one of her thin eyebrows as Patience grew a smile on her face.

"Okay, I have no idea what you just said, but it sounds good to me! Let's go!"

"Yeah, you don't care where we go as long as there are force gems, right?" Faith asked, getting a grin of her own.

"And you don't care as long as you get to fight," Patience countered, sticking her tongue out.

"We'll play tomorrow, okay? Mom and Dad wanted you two in bed by 9:30 and it's 9:45 right now. So shut off the video game and tuck yourselves in," Hope told the other girls while disconnecting her link cable. Faith and Patience started to pout. They didn't want to go to bed. Suddenly, Faith's eyes lit up.

"There are lots of puzzles in the Dark Woods," she said, knowing that puzzles were Hope's favorite part of the whole game. For a moment, Hope hesitated...but only for a moment.

"All the more reason to look forward to it tomorrow!" She smiled. The other two groaned. It was Hope's turn to smirk. "Nice try. Now one of you shut off the game while the other brushes her teeth." Faith and Patience looked at each other and, after a silent agreement, Faith went into the bathroom while Patience started rolling up the link cables. Hope followed Faith out of her little sisters' room and went into her own room across the hall.

Patience had almost gotten everything put away. She hit the save button, said "no" to 'continue playing', and went back in the title screen. She hit the power button off and turned off the television. Getting her bed ready for the night, she suddenly heard the Zelda theme song coming from the television. Patience looked confused and a little nervous since the power button was on and she _knew _that she had shut both the television and the game off. Hope popped her head back in the room.

"I thought I told you guys to go to sleep!" she said.

"We were, but the game turned on by itself after I shut it off!" Patience argued. Hope rolled her eyes.

"Come on, that's ridiculous," she said, going over to the Gamecube. "A game can't turn on by..." she tried pushing the power button off. The game stayed on. "...itself."

"AHHHH!!" Patience screamed. "It's haunted!" Faith ran in after hearing the scream.

"What happened?" she asked.

"The game won't turn off," Hope answered. "According to Patience, she turned it off, but it came back on." Faith glared at her sisters.

"If the Gamecube or Four Swords Adventures is broken, I'm going to wrap the cords around both of your necks," she said, almost growling. Patience hid behind Hope, as Faith went over to their Gamecube. After checking it and trying the reset and power buttons, she asked, "You didn't trip over anything?"

"No," the youngest answered.

"Pull the Gamecube?"

"Nope."

"Do something to the T.V.?"

"Uh-uh."

"Then what _did_ you do?!"

"I hit save and went back to the title screen. I shut it off, and then it came back on to the title screen again," Patience answered. Faith looked at the T.V. It had Zelda: Four Swords Adventures near the top, but the background was swirling yellow and orange.

"Wait," she said. "This isn't the title screen. The title screen has dark clouds with a castle in the background."

"...You're right," Hope agreed after inspecting the screen again.

"Well, that's a first." Patience ducked Faith's swiping hand, then started tapping the television screen as if that would solve their problems. Suddenly, a blinding green light shot out at them. The girls covered their eyes as they felt a vortex suck them in. Blinking slowly, they soon found themselves in some sort of sanctuary.

"Err..." The three girls looked at the blond, blue-eyed boy as he spoke. "When the legend said the sword would make the wielder into four, I assumed we would all be the same gender." The speaker was unmistakably Link. Faith was the next one to speak.

"Oh, crud." That was all there was time to say. In the next instant, all four of them were swept up in a twister as the wind sorcerer Vaati escaped from his prison.


	2. Link, Swords, and Force Gems

**Krista: **Coolness! Someone likes this! Thank you, PsynergyMaster and Steeple333 for the wonderful reviews. And yes, I am continuing it. Without any further rambling, here's chapter two!

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**_Chapter Two_: Link, Swords, and Force Gems**

"Ohhhhh..."

"Ow..."

"That hurt!"

"Finally, you three are awake." Hope, Faith, and Patience looked up from their positions on the ground at Link. The young man was seated on a rock, watching them with an expression that featured a cross between curiosity and edginess. It seemed as if he had been awake much longer than the sisters have.

"Where are we?" Hope looked around uncertainly as the sisters got up with a few aches and pains.

"What just happened?" Patience asked.

"What am I wearing?!" Hope and Patience glared at Faith. The middle sister blinked at them. "What? I don't like this outfit!" She was wearing a red tunic with white leggings and brown, leather boots. The other two had the same thing, except Hope was in blue and Patience was all in purple. Faith's hair was in a high ponytail, Patience's pigtails were neater, and Hope's hair was down since it was short.

"I don't mind it that much," Hope said, twisting her body slightly to inspect herself. Faith rolled her eyes.

"It feels like a skirt," she muttered disdainfully.

"Aww...!"

"What is it, Patience?" Hope asked.

"We don't have any cute hats like Link does!" the youngest said, complaining.

"Thank God," Faith mumbled under her breath.

"Um, hello...?" Link asked, trying to get the girls' attention.

"Hi! How ya doing?" Patience shot back. Faith and Hope nudged her to knock it off.

"Uh, good, I guess," Link answered, looking at her like she was nuts. "Anyway," he went on, "aren't you girls wondering what you're doing here?"

"Standing." This time it was Faith's turn to be nudged. Link's shoulders drooped.

"So, I'm hopin--er, guessing that you three aren't copies of me?" he asked.

Faith scoffed with a bit of a smirk playing on her lips. "Definitely _not_."

"We're just three sisters from another world who somehow got here," Hope explained as if it happened every day. "My name's Hope. I'm the oldest."

"My name's Patience. I'm the youngest!" Patience said, her voice echoing through the clearing the four were in.

"I kind of guessed that." Link uncovered his ears.

"Patience is a really good name for her," Faith told him.

"Why, thank y--" Patience started to say.

"It's what most people need when they're around her."

"--Wait, what?" Patience looked at her older sister, confused. Hope rolled her eyes.

"And you are...?" Link asked.

"Name's Faith."

"Pleased to meet you."

"Ditto."

"Cool!" Everyone looked at Patience as she proceeded to hack the evil bush to pieces. "We got swords!" Hope and Faith pulled theirs out of the sheaths on their backs. The oldest one just looked at it, while Faith grinned.

"Awesome..." she whispered to herself and joined Patience in cutting the grass.

"So, uh," Hope started to say to Link, "what are we supposed to do here?" Link, glad that someone was interested in hearing about their quest, answered:

"Well, Kaepora Gaebora said to---"

"Who's that?" Patience all of a sudden reappeared beside them, making the Hylian teenager jump.

"The owl dude," Faith answered, coming up behind her. Patience, looking amazed, stared at Link.

"No kidding?" she asked. "You can actually pronounce his name?"

"Uh, yeah..." Link looked a little nervous.

"Stop staring, Patience. You're scaring him," Faith commanded, oblivious to Link's glare.

"Let him finish!" Hope told her sisters.

"Um, anyway," Link continued, "he said to start our quest to save the maidens and Princess Zelda, we need to start collecting force gems to power up our swords. And--"

"Hee, hee, hee, force gems!" Patience laughed evilly. Link arched his eyebrows. Hope sighed.

"You'll get used to it," she said. "Continue, please."

"Uh, okay, he also told us to be careful because there are a lot of enemies around," he finally finished. Faith did a spin attack with her sword, since she just figured out how to do it, and said:

"Well, what are we waiting for? Let's go save a maiden!" She cut the last patch of grass and...

"FORCE GEM!!" Patience yelled, startling everyone, as she dived for the little green gem. She grabbed it and looked at everyone. "Okay, we can go now. Lead the way Link!"

"...Right..." Link started to go west and the trio of sisters followed.

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**Krista: **Please bare with me, since this is my first humor fic. Okay, hope you enjoyed it and don't forget to review! 


	3. Lake Hylia Pt One

**Krista: **I'm getting more reviews than I thought I would with this story. A big thank you to everyone who gave me the glorious reviews! An extra thanx to Steeple333 for telling me how to pronounce Kaepora Gaebora, lol. Enjoy chapter three!

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_**Chapter Three:**_** Lake Hylia: Part One**

"Are we there, yet?"

"Patience, we just started! Why are you asking?" Faith asked her little sister, irritated.

"Just practicing." Patience gave her sisters an evil grin.

"Whose house is this?" Hope asked. They stopped in front of a house that had four girls in the back lining up in various ways.

"I dunno, but they better get new plants," Faith said as she chopped down the bushes growing on the side of the house. Patience helped so she could get more force gems.

After a few moments, Faith looked back up and noticed that one of their group was missing. "Hey, where'd Hope go?"

Link stopped watching the four other girls in back of the house and looked around. "She was here a second ago," he answered.

"Hey, guys!" Hope stuck her head out from inside the house. "This nice gentleman will teach us about formations." With shrugs to each other, Link, Faith, and Patience followed Hope and the gentleman into the backyard. The other girls that were already there started giggling when Link came into their view. Faith rolled her eyes when Link started to blush. Then she had to keep from laughing out loud because Patience was making gagging and choking faces behind the Hylian. Hope, who thought this scene of the girls and Link was rather cute, gave each of her sisters a tap on the head to tell them to knock it off.

"Okay, first formation," the grandfather, or gentleman as Hope called him, yelled out. "Box!" The four granddaughters lined up two by two. Two girls in front, the other two right behind them. Link and company did the same thing with Link and Faith in the back, and Hope and Patience in front of them.

"Wide!" They all lined up in a horizontal line with Link and Patience on the ends, Faith next to Link and Hope next to Patience.

"Long!" This was basically the same thing as the Wide Formation, except it was a vertical line.

"And, finally," the grandfather called out, "Cross!" Everyone moved so they would be covering each other's backs. Link was looking north, Hope had east, Patience was facing south, and Faith was guarding the west.

"Excellent! We're done! Here's some force gems for your hard work." The grandfather put a small purple force gem near them. "If you have any questions, just ask Rose, Daisy, Violet, or Lily for advice." He pointed to each of his granddaughters as he said their names, and went back into the house.

"My force gem!" Patience ran and grabbed it just as Link was about to pick it up. Her sudden yell made the granddaughters jump and try to hide behind one another. Hope just stood there because she was used to this kind of thing, like Faith, but she wasn't laughing, unlike Faith.

"I'm sorry!" Faith told the granddaughters when she noticed she was getting death glares from them. "But it was funny the way you jumped."

"Ok, let's go now," Patience said, pocketing the gem.

"See ya and tell your grandfather we said thank-you." Hope was leading her sisters out of the gate from the backyard. Faith could only wave because she was still trying not to laugh.

"Bye ladies," Link said, following a dancing Patience out the gate.

"You're leaving already?" Lily asked.

"We don't even know you're name," Rose pointed out. Hope, Faith, and Patience realized that they were only talking to Link, not them.

"Errr...it's Link."

"Ohh...you look so strong, Link," Daisy cooed.

"Oh, brother." Faith rolled her eyes and looked the other way.

"I think I'm going to be sick." Patience held her stomach.

"Oh, stop it," Hope scolded them. "Let them talk for a few minutes. Besides, I think it's sweet."

"Fine," Faith reluctantly agreed, "but only for a minute."

_**Two Hours Later...**_

"Yeah, it was me who sent Ganondorf to the Sacred Realm..."

"Is he done with his life story yet?" Patience asked.

"Okay, I think this has gone on long enough," Hope said through gritted teeth. Her sisters looked at her, amazed. It wasn't that often that their eldest sister would sound this annoyed. "Faith, drag him away from those four," she commanded. Faith responded with an evil grin.

"No prob."

"Yes, it was a hard fight, but I--"

"Okay, Link, time to go," Faith said.

"No, you can't take Linkie away!" Violet told her.

A look of disbelief passed over Faith's face. "'Linkie?' You can't come up with a better nickname?" she asked. "And, yes, I can take him away, because he has to go save his frie..." she hesitated slightly and the evil smile reappeared, "..._steady_ girlfriend." All four granddaughters gasped, as Hope and Patience were trying not to laugh at Link's face. "Let's go." Faith grabbed his arm and led him and her sisters away from them.

"Zelda's not my girlfriend!" Link protested.

"Nevertheless, we have to save her, remember?" Hope asked.

"So, let's get more force gems and start saving her and the maidens!" Patience said as she chopped up every bush she passed.

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**Krista: **Okay, how'd you like this chapter? Please tell which it is in the review that you are about to so graciously give me. Thanks! 


	4. Lake Hylia Pt Two

**Krista:** Thank you, PsynergyMaster for yet another great review. It's pretty easy getting funny ideas if you have an older sister who's a natural stand-up comedian and a little sister who's nickname is "Stuntwoman" (you can imagine what she does). Then I add my little witty, sarcastic remarks, mostly so Faith can use them. My older sister, Marie, is like Hope and Patience does act like Ann, my little sister (especially in this chapter!). Hope you all enjoy this chapter!

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_**Chapter Four:**_** Lake Hylia: Part Two**

"Hey, look guys, there's a switch!" Hope said as she stepped on it. Two small red gems fell from the sky.

"Yay! More force gems!" Patience squealed as she went to pick one up. She was about to grab the other one, but Faith beat her to it. "Hey!" the younger one protested.

"Let the rest of us have some too, Squirt," Faith told her. She looked at Link. "Where to now, O Leader of Ours?" she asked sarcastically. Link gave her a glare before answering.

"Let's line up in that wide formation to push this boulder into the water," he said. "We might be able to use it as a bridge."

"_That_ huge thing?!" Patience asked in disbelief, her eyes wide as she stared at the rock.

"Are you sure we can push it?" Hope said, her head tilted as she tried to see the top of the stone.

"Come on, girls! We're strong enough if we do it together!" Link told them.

"Let's try it to humor Mr. Optimistic here." Faith pointed to a now-scowling Link. So they all started to push it and after a couple of tries the boulder fell in with a huge splash.

"Like, my outfit! It's ruined!" Patience wailed, trying to act like a fashion-crazed teenage girl.

"Suck it up, it'll dry," Faith said, wringing out part of her own outfit.

"You two coming?" Link and Hope were already on the other side. The other two caught up as Hope came out of a cave that was there.

"We need to get into the cube formation to see what's in the next room," she informed the others.

"Box," Link corrected her as they were walking in.

"Whatever," was the reply. After they all stepped on the button in the box formation, the next door opened and inside the room was a single boomerang. Link looked at the sisters and asked:

"Either of you girls know how to use a boomerang?" Faith and Patience gave each other nervous glances, then pointed to Hope.

"She does!" they said in unison. Hope looked at them.

"Not really...," she told them. It was true that she was the one who usually used the boomerang when they were playing the game, but this time she didn't have the leisure of having a controller for the weapon.

"Better than us," Faith responded. Hope sighed and took the new weapon.

"I know where you can test it!" Patience yelled as she ran out of the cave. The others hurried to catch up. "There! Throw it and get the force gem!" Patience pointed to a red force gem floating over the river that they had to make the bridge for.

"She's right, you might as well try it," Link said. Hope, looking nervous, took a deep breath, was about to throw, but turned to the others and said:

"Back up, I don't know where this thing's going to fly!" At once, Link and Faith took a giant step back, while Patience had to take two to stay next to them. Hope let the boomerang fly; it caught the force gem, then flew back to her. It was as if the weapon knew where to go. The oldest sister let out a sigh of relief.

"Was that it?!" Faith complained. Her sisters glared at her.

"You sure you've never used a boomerang before?" Link asked.

"Positive," Hope answered in a mumble, pretty sure that he would not believe her if she told him about his life being a game, as the group all went north. There they saw a house being blocked by a dark person that looked like Link. He was bouncing up and down like he was on a sugar high.

"That must be Shadow Link," Link said through gritted teeth.

"Did he have too much coffee or something?" Patience asked, moving her head up and down as Shadow Link jumped.

"I think he looks like he has to go to the bathroom," Hope commented. Faith was looking around and noticed rocks surrounding a stump fairly close to Shadow Link. Suddenly, he jumped right in front of the rocks as Link tried to take a swipe at him with his sword. Link kept trying to slice him, but Shadow Link was jumping back and forth. Faith rolled her eyes at the repeated leaps and positioned herself in front of the rocks. While Shadow Link was taunting the good Link, he didn't realize that he was jumping into a trap. When he bounced in front of Faith, she let him have it--

"OW!" Shadow Link, and the real Link, stared at Faith in surprise. About to pick up the big green force that he dropped, Shadow Link got attacked by Patience's sword. Then, being the little force gem stealer that she is, Patience picked the gem up and gave him a "this-is-mine-you-take-it-you-die" look. Shadow Link backed off.

"Fine," he yelled," go ahead and take it! I'll be back, though!"

"I'm sure," Faith said as Shadow Link swirled around and went into the ground. The four watched as his shadow ran away.

"Dang it!" Link yelled.

"Dialogues in games can be so boring if they're rated E," Faith commented with a chuckle. Hope raised one of her eyebrows, then asked Link what was wrong.

"Shadow Link must've locked the door to this house!" he complained, jiggling the doorknob.

"Um, maybe it's locked from the inside, and the person doesn't want you to barge into their house?" Patience asked. Link glared at her.

"Move over," Hope commanded as she unlocked the door with a key.

"Where'd you...?" Link started to say.

"Behind those stumps," she answered. "Got it with the boomerang." Hope and Patience went inside while Faith and Link waited outside and got rid of the octoroc monsters that had showed up for the party.

There was a lady who thanked the two sisters inside the house for getting rid of the 'shadow man,' and said there was an item they could use in her backyard. Hope and Patience both had to lift the big rock out of the way to get it underneath. When they saw it, Patience started laughing evilly.

"Ohhh...fire rod!"

Back to Link and Faith

"So...," Link started to say, slicing up the last octoroc, "how'd you know where to stand to hit Shadow Link?"

"He kept jumping around in the same spots," Faith answered.

"What made you decide to help me?"

"You started to look like an idiot, running back and forth," she said, smirking. Link scowled at her when...

"MUAHAHAHAHA!!" Link jumped and held his sword ready. Faith sighed.

"Relax," she told him. "I think that's just Patience." Link went wide-eyed, as Patience ran out of the house with a rod that had a flame on the end.

"Hee, hee, hee, fire rod!" She laughed as she ran around, narrowly missing the many trees around them. Faith glared at Hope when she came out.

"You let her have the fire rod?!"

"What was I supposed to do?" Hope protested. "I already had the boomerang!"

"I think you'd better take it away from her, or something," Link said. "Otherwise, she's going to..."

"BURN!" Link, Hope, and Faith watched as Patience burned the whole field in front of the house down.

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**Krista: **Well? Alright, the thing that Patience did at the end is something that Ann would do! I'm not kidding; she's like a total pyro! By the way, if anybody has any ideas, for future chapters, put them in your reviews and I'll try to fit them in, with due credit of course. Don't feel bad if I don't though; it doesn't mean the idea wasn't good. I think I'm gonna make fun of Tingle next chapter. Anybody actually like that fairy wanna-be? If someone does, then I won't make fun of him too badly. Okay, R&R please! 


	5. Lake Hylia Pt Three

**Krista:** Thank you people for the reviews! This story is getting more than I thought it would. Get ready because in this chapter everyone meets Tingle! (cue the freaky horror music.)

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_**Chapter Five:**_** Lake Hylia: Part Three**

Once they calmed Patience down, Link, Hope and Faith got her to set fire to the stumps that were blocking a big rock. Link and Faith lifted it out of the way and Hope went down to scout if there were any enemies. When she yelled that there weren't any, the others went down into the cave. Climbing a ladder, they saw a switch. Link hit it, making a bridge so they could cross to the other side. Patience waited beside the switch while the other three started to go on the bridge. When they were all on, she hit the switch, making the bridge disappear, and her sisters and Link fall to the ground. Laughing like a maniac, Patience hit the switch again, ran across, and grabbed the little red force gem in the treasure chest that was there. Faith wanted to strangle her little sister, but Hope stopped her. After a while, they stopped on a ledge in front of a river, with trees on both sides of them.

"That was an annoyingly long intro," Faith complained.

"I almost fell asleep," Hope said.

"You mean we can talk now?" Patience asked, removing the duct tape from her mouth that kept her from speaking.

"Yes, finally," Link muttered the answer. He looked at the river. "Guess it's time for a swim."

"Are you sure there isn't another way to go?" Faith asked, peering into the water.

"It's just a little river, Faith," Hope said, trying to comfort her sister.

"Is something wrong?" Link looked at the sisters, apparently confused.

"Faith's scared of water," Patience told him.

"I am not!" her older sister cried defensively. "I just don't like swimming!"

"Don't worry, Faith," Link said, "I won't let anything happen to you."

"Uhhh...sure..." Faith raised her eyebrows, wondering why the heck he would say something like that. It must be the hero-gene in his DNA. She sighed. "Let's just get this over with!"

"CANNONBALL!" Patience yelled as she jumped into the river. Hope went next, and splashed Patience for getting her wet. Link was waiting for Faith to go in next, but she was too interested watching her sisters trying to drown one another. Finally, he pushed her in. She was a bit mad when she resurfaced.

With a gasp and a shake of her fist, she yelled, "Link, you &#$!" Her sisters stopped playing and stared, amused and amazed at that beeping sound that had emerged from their sister's mouth. Meanwhile, Link just smirked, jumped and splashed all three of them. Faith swam over and held him under. When she let go, he came up choking and glared at her. Faith glared right back.

"Serves you right!" she told him.

"Hey," Hope hissed at her 14-year-old sister, knowing full-well what Faith had been trying to call Link," this is supposed to be E rated!"

"Screw the rating!" Patience looked at Faith eagerly. "Call him that again! The beeping sound was funny!"

"Patience!" Hope tried to scold them, but she may as well been talking to a force gem. One was too stubborn, and the other was way too hyper to listen. The four swam under a bridge and onto this little strip of land. Faith and Patience lifted the boulder that was in there way, to find a middle-aged man in a green outfit stuck under it. He stared at Link, who started to back away slowly.

His eyes wide in amazement, the man gasped. "Those clothes...that hat...you must be a fairy, come to help Tingle in his time of need!" The short man did a little...er...'dance.' Link was about to say that he wasn't a fairy, when Tingle started ranting about how force gem collecting was the latest thing and that they were now in competition to collect them.

"Don't follow me!" he told them. They were wondering why they would want to. "Kooloo-Limpah!" After saying these strange words, a giant red balloon inflated from the pack on his back and he floated out from underneath the bridge. The four just stood where they were, blinking, and wondering about what just happened. Finally, Hope spoke:

"Alright, that guy seriously needs a psychiatrist!" They all jumped back in the river and were swimming towards a set of stairs on the side of a cliff right next to a huge waterfall.

"Amen to that!" Faith agreed.

"Where did he get off thinking that _I_ was a fairy?" Link asked.

"He said it had something to do with your clothes," Patience answered. They were walking up the stairs now. Hope and Faith were slightly faster and a little ahead of them.

"I've never seen a fairy wearing a green tunic!" Link said.

"Let alone a hat," Patience pointed out. When those two reached the top, they were gasping slightly for breath. The other two were waiting for them.

"What took you guys so long?" Hope asked.

"You two aren't fazed about how tiring these stairs are?" Patience asked right back.

"Believe me, this is nothing compared to all the stairs in our high school," the eldest sister answered.

"Yeah." Faith nodded her head. "You walk, like, a mile going to and from classes." They all entered the cave that was there and jumped out of the cannon. Link and Faith went to the top right away, while Hope, with her sharp eyes, saw a treasure chest and landed on the little ledge to get it. After taking the small purple force gem, she jumped back up with Link and Faith, shaking slightly from the height. Patience, however, kept using the cannon to try to get a big green, floating force gem. Of course, she kept missing. Finally, Link couldn't wait anymore.

"Oh, for the love of Nayru!" he yelled, startling Hope and causing Faith to raise an eyebrow at him. Link jumped back down and caught the floating gem on the way. Patience was glaring at him when he reached the bottom.

"We have the gem! Can we go now?" Link asked. Patience stuck her tongue out, pushed him out of the way, and used the cannon to catch up with her sisters. When Link came up, they all went outside onto a tiny ledge that was sticking out of the cliff. Hope slashed the plants and revealed a switch. She pressed it and force gems rained down on top of the cliff. Patience let out a squeal.

"Come on!" she said. "Let's get them before they disappear!" The four were about to go through the other entrance to the cave, when they heard a "Wow!" from across the waterfall. Tingle was floating towards the force gems. Patience panicked.

"Ack! He's gonna take the gems!" And before one could say "Kooloo-Limpah," Patience was at the top of the cliff with her fire rod out in front. Tingle seemed to be oblivious to her and kept coming.

"DIE, BALLOON-BOY!" she screamed and shot a fireball. He must've been blind and deaf too, because he didn't bother to move. The fireball caused the balloon to burst, sending Tingle tumbling down the waterfall. Hope went wide-eyed, Link couldn't help but start laughing, and Faith was watching eagerly to see if Tingle was drowning. Patience looked down at them and gave them a "I'm-_so_-good" grin.

"Well," she said," guess that takes care of him!"

"Yeah," Faith said, smirking," too bad you didn't grab the force gems before they disappeared, though." Patience's smile wiped off her face. She looked down at the spot where the gems used to be and, sure enough, they were gone.

* * *

**Krista: **OMG, I wanna end the Lake Hylia section already! You know what, if I averaged about four chapters to each section, there'd be about 96 chapters in this story, excluding the first and last few chapters. Maybe some of you guys don't care or are happy about that, but I'm getting sick of the same sections. But I'll keep at it as long as you people give me encouraging reviews! Happy Veteran's Day! 


	6. Lake Hylia Pt Four

**Krista: **Thancks for the reviews, people! By the way, duct tape was only on Patience's mouth, PsynergyMaster, lol; I'm not evil! It was just to show that she needed a little help to keep from talking.

* * *

_**Chapter Six: **_**Lake Hylia: Part Four**

After Link, Hope, and Faith caught up to a disgruntled Patience, they went onward to find another giant waterfall. Faith groaned to show how pleased she was. After looking around for a couple of minutes, Hope found three caves in the most obvious spot: behind the waterfall.

"I'll go search in the first one!" Patience yelled and, before anyone could say anything, ran in. The other three were deciding who should go in which of the last two caves when all of a sudden, BAM!

"Sorry, didn't know you guys were standing right there," Patience apologized for running into her now grounded sisters and a semi-conscious Link.

"Ow...What are you doing back out here?" Hope asked, rubbing her head. "Did you forget something?"

"Like your mind?" Faith mumbled. Her younger sister glared at her before answering.

"No, it's just that it's a dead end. There's nothing in there." Link sighed.

"Guess that solves our problem," he said. "Two of us will go in that one and the others go in the other one." He looked at the sisters. "Who wants to go with whom?" Patience, once again, spoke up.

"I call Hope, because she actually waits for me when I'm looking for force gems!" She grabbed her oldest sister's arm and pulled her into the farthest cave. Link just stared after them for a second.

"Um, okay. Guess I'm with you, Faith."

"Well, who else are you going to be with?" she asked, leading the way into the middle cave, "Tingle?" Link scowled, then caught up with her. Literally two seconds later, the two faced a huge hole.

"Hey, you guys!" They looked across the low wall next to them to see Hope smiling at them and Patience waving as if she hadn't seen them in years.

"You two need to come into this cave," Hope told them. "There are four switches that we each need to step on." Groaning slightly, Link and Faith went outside and into the last cave. Stepping on all the switches, they made a bridge appear over the hole. Link, Hope, and Patience went outside once again and into the middle cave. Faith was there, waiting for them in front of the bridge, smirking.

"What the...?" Link looked at her, puzzled. "Weren't you behind us?"

"Yeah, I was," she answered, "but I decided to leap over the low wall instead of walking around outside again."

"Man, you're lazy," Patience said. Faith pretended to be hurt.

"That's not very nice," she told her younger sister. "Say you're sorry, or I'll take the two treasure chests that are across the bridge."

"Treasure chests?" Patience looked eagerly across the bridge and started running towards it.

"Patience be...!" Hope started to call out. Her youngest sister ran across the bridge without a thought in the world. "...careful."

"YO!" The other three weren't sure if Patience was pleased or irked at what she found. They went across and found her staring at the treasure chests. She turned and glared at Faith.

"One of them is already opened!"

"Did I mention that I took the heart container?" Faith smiled innocently. Her sister continued to glare at her. "Relax! If I remember correctly, the other one should have 100 force gems." Patience's eyes lit up as she took the big green gem from the other chest.

"What do you mean 'remember correctly?'" Link asked. Hope answered.

"Forget about it, Link."

"But--"

"Look guys, another switch!" Hope stepped on it and a bridge formed across the next hole. However, when she stepped off it, the bridge disappeared. Too bad Link was trying to cross it. He fell all the way down into the darkness when, all of a sudden, he reappeared next to the girls, with his body blinking.

"So that's what happens when you fall down a hole," Faith said. Then she looked thoughtfully at Patience. The eleven-year-old's eyes widened.

"Eh, I'll hold the switch down so you three can cross," she offered, with a nervous laugh. So the other three crossed but, when Patience stepped off the switch, the bridge disappeared, leaving her stranded. "Hey, do the little warp thingy!"

"You can't warp if there are four players," Faith told her.

"Sure, now you tell me!" Patience threw her hands up in the air. Link looked totally confused at the words 'warp and 'players,' since they referred to the game. Hope looked worried for Patience.

"How is she going to get over here?" she asked.

"I could try running and jumping," Patience said thoughtfully, looking over the hole.

"DON'T. YOU. DARE!" her eldest sister yelled, startling the other three.

"You could try seeing if the fire rod will weigh the switch down," Link suggested.

"NO!" Patience screamed, causing the Hylian to fall on the ground. "I won't give up my fire rod! YOU CAN'T MAKE ME!"

"ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT!" Link yelled, so she could hear him. Then he sighed, wondering how the heck he was going to save Zelda and the maidens if he was stuck with these three.

"Give me the boomerang," Faith piped up suddenly. Everyone stared at her for a second, before Hope slowly handed it over. Faith got ready to throw it, right towards her little sister.

"What are you--AHHH!" Patience was now spinning above the hole, thanks to the boomerang. When she was safely on the other side, the boomerang let her go and flew back to Faith, who gave it back to Hope. "Whoa...!" Patience was walking around dizzily, and would have fallen in the hole if Link hadn't caught her.

"Can you do that in the game?" Hope asked in a whisper so Link wouldn't hear.

"Yeah," Faith whispered back, grinning. "I do it to Patience when she's trying to reach a treasure chest."

Then they went outside and did what would be Faith's favorite part of the whole adventure (not!). They had to jump down the huge waterfall then go swimming underwater and into another cave. There, Link found a big red force gem and Faith found a blue bracelet, which halves the damage a person takes. Going into the next little underground cave, Patience also got a big red force gem. After she collected it, a cool thing happened with the swords. They started glowing yellow and orange, much like the television's background when the girls got sucked into the game.

"Awesome," Patience said, while spinning her sword around. A beam of energy shot out of it and made a hole in the wall of the cave. "DOUBLE AWESOME!" The four made their way out of the cave and destroyed a bunch of soldiers on a bridge. All Link and the sisters did was swing their swords, and the little beams of energy did the rest. As they went west of the bridge, a fence popped up behind them, locking them in an area with a Chief Soldier and six regular soldiers.

"Alright, here's the plan," Patience said, surprising the others. "Hope and Faith take out the mini soldiers, and Link kills the big one."

"And what will you do?" Link asked suspiciously, raising an eyebrow.

"I will be hiding over there in that corner!" Patience started walking over to her 'corner,' when Hope did the boomerang trick and brought her back.

"You have to help!" Hope told her.

"I don't wanna!" the youngest whined.

"I don't know why you don't want to fight," Faith said, with a sly smile. "You have the fire rod." Patience's eyes lit up.

After planning and avoiding the soldiers for a few minutes, they set out to fight. Hope used her boomerang to stun the regular soldiers, then Patience burned them until they disappeared, leaving a few force gems behind. Faith and Link were taking turns attacking the Chief Soldier. One would distract him while the other hits from behind with his sword. In no time, all seven enemies were gone, and it rained force gems. They grabbed as many as they could and then, once again, they headed west where they found their first barrier of darkness. They each hit one sphere and watched their force gems turn into force fairies. Well...Link, Hope, and Faith watched. Patience whined about how her gems were leaving her. A bigger entrance was revealed and Link read the sign next to it.

"The 'Cave of No Return.' Hm...charming name."

Faith sighed and mumbled, "One level down...Twenty-three more to go."

* * *

**Krista: **YAYNESS! I'm done with Lake Hylia!!! Finally! Next is the Cave of No Return, obviously. That should only take about two chapters. Three at the most. Although I'm sure you people only care about me getting the chapters out on time. And for me to do that, I'll need to go work on the 7th chapter and get reviews. R&R, please! 


	7. Cave of No Return Pt One

**New Disclaimer: **I also don't own the show "Blue's Clues"...Please don't ask; you'll see when you read.

**Krista:** Thanks to Kon Hoshi, lilBlondi, and Masterful Foxboy for the reviews; I greatly appreciate them. And now for the long-awaited arrival of chapter seven!

* * *

_**Chapter Seven:**_** Cave of No Return: Part One**

"Whoa, it's dark in here!"

"Really, Hope? I didn't think the rest of us realized that we're walking around in a pitch black room," Faith said sarcastically. Hope glared at her, although no one saw because, like Faith said, it was pitch black.

"It's too dark. I don't like this. I'm scared!" Patience wailed.

"Are you the thing that's clinging to my arm?"

"Oh, is that you, Link? I didn't know who the heck I was holding! What am I touching now?"

"Hey, don't knock my hat off!"

"Oops. Sorry, Link." Suddenly, the room became lighter, because Hope found a lamp and lit the two torches in the room. The door at the other end of the room opened. However, the girls didn't notice because they were too busy laughing at Link.

"(hee, hee) Link has (hee, hee) HAT HAIR! HA, HA, HA, HA!" Patience laughed along with her sisters. Link grabbed his hat and put it back on his head.

"Shut up," he said, practically growling at them, as he led the way into the next room. That room was also dark except for a little light from Hope's lamp and a circle of flames blocking a treasure chest in the center of the room. The flames were surrounded by a low wall.

"Oooo, fire!" A huge grin appeared on Patience's face.

"Does she have problems or something?" Link asked.

"No, she just likes fire," Hope answered calmly, as she lit the torches and collected the force gems that fell from the ceiling. Faith went a little ahead and got a big green force gem from a treasure chest that was outside the low wall. Then she called to the others.

"You guys going to help me get the other treasure chest or what?" She was now in the center of the room, next to the wall of flames. The others hurried to where she was. When they were all facing the fire, Hope spoke next.

"So, how do we get rid of the fire?" There were four stone blocks near the corners of the low wall, and when Link leaned against one, it slid all the way into the corner. While Link fell, the girls heard a clicky sound. It was a sound that basically said, 'Alright, you figured out the first part! Now go do the rest!' The girls obliged by pushing the remaining stones into their respective corners. The fire went out, revealing the treasure chest unharmed.

"My treasure!" Patience shouted. She opened it and found, "A key?! Why couldn't it have been a big, fat, purple force gem?" Hope snatched the key from her younger sister's hand.

"I'll take this," she said. "You'll probably just lose it anyway." Patience stuck out her tongue while her eldest sister unlocked the door. They came in a room that had a maze-like structure, with various medium-sized stones blocking different pathways. Suddenly, a squeak came from the darkness.

"I just heard a rat," Link pointed out.

"Don't worry," Patience said, "I'll get rid of it with my handy-dandy--"

"Notebook!" Hope finished. Everyone turned to her with puzzled looks, Link perhaps being the most confused of all. She shrugged. "Sorry, I work in a preschool."

"O-kay, anyway," Patience responded. "As I was saying, I'll get rid of it with my handy-dandy fire--hey, where'd my fire rod go?"

"You got a fire rod here?" Faith asked.

"Not here, behind the old lady's house," Patience answered her, while lifting different rocks, looking for her weapon.

"Didn't you realize your fire rod and my boomerang disappear after we hit the barrier of darkness?" Hope asked.

"WHAT?!" Patience jumped up, her eyes wide.

"Apparently not," Faith muttered as an answer. Patience looked teary-eyed.

"It's gone? NOOO!!" After she screamed "no" for a few minutes, Faith tapped her on the shoulder.

"There's a small red force gem after we get through this room," she said.

"Okay!" Patience became all perky and bright.

"So can we get going now?" Link asked impatiently.

"Sure, why not?" Hope answered, bored. So, the four set to work, getting in the box formation and pushing the stone blocks. They occasionally killed a few evil rats that tried to take their force gems. Eventually, they found a key and were about to unlock the door when Patience started complaining.

"Wait, I didn't get the force gem! Where is it?"

"I think I saw a treasure chest back there." Hope pointed in back of her.

"We can't go back and get it now," Link said. "We have to keep going so we can save Zelda."

"No!" Patience protested. "We have to get the force gem! Otherwise, our swords won't power up!"

"You don't really care about that," Faith accused. "You just want to get it because they're like money!" Patience shrugged.

"But she's right," Hope said. "If the swords aren't powered up, then we can't break the barriers or defeat Vaati."

"And if we can't defeat Vaati, then Zelda, the maidens, and all of Hyrule is screwed!" Faith finished, agreeing with her sisters' points. She received a glare from Hope for her language. Link sighed.

"Alright, I didn't want a huge explanation!" They started to backtrack.

"Didn't Kaepora Gaebora tell you about how the force gems power up the swords?" Hope asked him.

"Uh...well...," Link started to say, looking a bit sheepish, "I think I remember him saying something about it but I wasn't really listening." Hope shook her head in dismay.

"Does anyone really listen to that bird-brain?" Faith asked to no one in particular.

"You should," Hope said. "He tells you a lot of important stuff!"

"Yeah, and most of the important stuff you already know!" Faith retorted. The four finally found the other treasure chest.

"Bum badda da ba!" sang Patience as she took the red force gem from the chest and held it over her head like the game Link does in many of the video games. Suddenly, a rat leaped, grabbed the gem, and ran off.

"Hey, get back here, you little thief!" Patience yelled, as she raced after it, swinging her sword in all directions.

* * *

**Krista:** So, how was it? R&R! 


	8. Cave of No Return Pt Two

**Krista:** Thanks to Kon Hoshi, lilBlondi, and me/nambe for the reviews! Sorry I haven't been able to update because of Christmas and me being sick for half the month. I have a bad cold as I type. Anyway, here's chapter eight!

* * *

_**Chapter Eight: **_**Cave of No Return: Part Two**

Patience was in a bad mood because she never did catch the rat. Link was a little ticked because they wasted time trying to get a force gem that they ended up losing anyway. So, those two kept arguing in the next room. This new room had small stone blocks that were either green, red, blue, or purple. Apparently, only the person who is wearing the same color can push the blocks.

"Link, are you colorblind?! That block is purple, not green!"

"Well, sor-RY Patience! It's kind of dark in here! Hope's the only one with the lamp!" Depending on who was closer, either Hope or Faith would go over and settle the argument. In this case, Faith was closer. However, Link and Patience were too busy bickering to hear her, so Faith first had to say something to get their attention.

"You two sound like a married old couple!" That shut them up. They glared at her as Hope's snickering could be heard from somewhere else in the room. Faith looked at the block and stared at Link and Patience like she wanted to knock their heads together.

"You two both need to learn your colors! This is RED!" Faith yelled, then pushed it out of the way. She pointed to the next two blocks. "Alright, that one is green, and that is purple. Get it straight!"

"Faith, come here!" Hope called. "I need you!"

"Gladly," her younger sister muttered, shaking her head at Patience and Link.

"Why don't you tell them who's right calmly?" Hope asked as they were pushing the red and blue blocks out of the way.

"If they can yell, I don't see why I can't," Faith answered, opening a chest and getting a big red force gem. Hope just sighed. Eventually, the four got to the other side of the room and went through the door. This next room had a hall and a room to the north and east at the end of it. Near the other room entries was a group of monsters squirting out water while hopping around four torches. Link, Hope, Faith, and Patience learned the hard way that the hall had four trapdoors. It wasn't that bad though, since Hope got a heart container and Patience got a big green force gem. She felt better because it was worth more than the gem that the rat took. After going back up to the room, the quartet defeated the monsters and the north and east rooms opened.

"I think there's a key in there," Hope said, pointing to the east room.

"Do all of us have to go in?" Patience asked, leaning against one of the torches that her oldest sister lit. "My feet hurt!"

"Sheesh, this is just the beginning and she's already complaining?" Faith mumbled.

"I'll go alone if you guys want to stay here," Link offered. "Besides," he added with a cocky grin," it might be too dangerous for girls if a key is hidden in there."

"WHAT!?" Faith exclaimed. "What's that supposed to mean?!"

"It means, you three stay here and I'll be right back," Link said and disappeared into the room.

"He shouldn't have said that," Patience stated darkly.

"I'm offended," Hope said with a small scowl. Faith turned to her sisters with a coy smile.

"Don't worry," she told them. "He'll get just what he deserves."

_**Fifteen Minutes Later...**_

Link came out panting, with his life meter a little low. He leaned against a torch, holding the newly-found key.

"Who would've known that the key would be hidden under tons of pots and evil torches would blow fireballs at you?" Link asked. The three girls raised their hands as an affirmative answer. Link looked confused. "How would you know?"

"We knew there was a key in there didn't we?" Hope asked back. Faith looked at Link.

"Was the key all you found?"

"Yes..." he answered slowly.

"I'll be right back," Faith said, as she walked into the east room. She came back about a minute later without so much as a scratch, and threw a heart container at Link.

"Did you know that if you'd have let us come, we could've told you that your shield can block fireballs?" Patience asked Link when he was all better. He glared at her.

"Alright, I learned something today!" Link yelled.

"Men can learn things?" Patience looked up at Hope.

"I guess so," she answered with a small smile.

"'Too dangerous for girls.' Yeah, right," Faith muttered as she passed Link going into the north room.

* * *

**Krista:** Another chapter done. Please R&R and I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! Or happy holidays if you don't celebrate Christmas. 


	9. Cave of No Return Pt Three

**Krista: **Yes, I'm finally putting this up! Thanks to lil-dragon-blue, lilBlondi, and Links1fangirl for the reviews and I'm sorry this took so long! But this is one of my longest chapters, so that should make some of you a little happy.

* * *

_**Chapter Nine:**_** Cave of No Return: Part Three**

The next room just had a locked door at the other end and a small part of land across a chasm. Hope looked at the chasm and smiled back at her sisters.

"Hey girls, guess what we get to do?"

"HUMAN SLINGSHOT!" Faith and Patience cried out together, startling Link.

"The what?" he asked.

"You'll see," Hope smiled at him. She looked at her sisters. "Who's going over?"

"I will!" Faith volunteered. Hope and Patience interlocked their fingers and hands, and made their palms facing up and as flat as possible. Faith placed a foot on their hands with her back to the chasm.

"You ready?" Patience asked. Her older sister grinned.

"Always am," she replied.

"Alright, then," Hope said, "on the count of three. One...two...THREE!" Link's eyes widened when Hope and Patience pushed up with their hands. Faith jumped at the right moment and did a back flip to get her body over the chasm.

"TA-DA!!" she said when she landed on the other side. "Now let's see what's over here."

Link grinned. "Not bad," he said. "Where did you three learn that?"

"We took a gymnastics course together one summer," Patience responded, keeping close to Hope and her lamp. Link nodded to the answer, but suddenly thought of something.

"How is Faith going to get back over here?" he asked. Hope frowned.

"Crap, I didn't think of that," she replied.

"Didn't think about what?" Faith was standing right next to her.

"She's not sure how you're going to get back here," Link explained. Faith arched her eyebrows at Patience, who shrugged. Link did a double take at Faith.

"Hey, how'd you get back here?"

"There was a switch there that made a bridge over the chasm," Faith answered.

"Was there anything good over there?" Hope asked.

"Ooohh, yeah!"

"I didn't like the sound of that!"

"Shut up, Patience!" Faith snapped. "There was a blue bracelet and THIS!" She held up the bow she found, along with the quiver of arrows on her back.

"Cool!" Patience exclaimed. "Can I play with them, Faith?"

"...No."

"But, why--"

"ALRIGHT, Link, let's go open that locked door, shall we?" Hope ordered, leading them toward the door.

"Uh, sure...right..." Link stammered, suddenly unsure as to who was the leader of this little group. The next room was dark, except for four torches burning right in front of them.

"Yipe, it's darker in here! Me no like it!" Patience complained.

"Make sense when you talk," Hope scolded.

"Actually, that's the most sense she's made in a while," Faith remarked.

"Will you please stop clinging to my arm, Patience?" Link asked. "I think you're cutting off the blood circulation."

"I'm not hanging onto anybody!" she shouted back.

"You're not?" Link asked. "Hope, is it you?"

"No, it's not me."

"...Faith?"

"Why the heck would I hang onto anyone?!"

"Then who...or _what_, is?"

"Hang on, Link," Faith said. "If I do this right, you'll be able to see in a minute." She aimed an arrow so it would go over a lit torch, catch on fire, and soar across the room. Letting it fly, the four watched as three more torches lit up. They also realized that there was a giant hole in between the two small land masses on each side of the room. Faith did the same thing to the other three torches closest to them. When all sixteen were lit, they noticed what was clinging to Link and why it was so dark.

"Goddesses, it's a whole colony of Keese!" Link slashed the one on his arm.

"Great observation, Link! We never would have guessed!" Faith shouted as she shot arrows as fast as she could at the bat-like monsters.

"Come on, you two have swords!" Link yelled at Hope and Patience, who were just watching the other two fight. "Use them!" Those three used their swords to get at the closer Keese, while Faith shot at the ones farther away. After a few minutes, there was only one Keese, but it was in the back of the room. Only an arrow would be able to reach it.

"Uh, Faith?" Hope asked. "Did you hear the narrator? Only an arrow can reach it!"

"Chill, will ya?" she responded. "Otherwise, Patience will get mad at you guys for making me forget this."

"Why'd you say 'guys'?" Link asked. "I didn't say anything!" Faith didn't answer as Patience started skipping around Hope and Link.

"We're gonna get more force gems, we're gonna get more force gems," she sang. Faith tripped her as a 'subtle' way of telling her to stop, then aimed an arrow for the crystal switch across the hole, and let it fly. Unfortunately, the Keese went in front of it and disappeared in a cloud of smoke. So, tons of force gems started to fall from the ceiling. Faith hurriedly shot another arrow. It hit the switch and made a bridge over the large chasm, catching most of the gems.

"That was close," Hope commented to Faith, who just muttered something like, "stupid bat". Those two heard snickering behind them and they turned to look at Link.

"What?" Faith demanded.

"Patience's face." Link laughed. "She looked like she was going to pass out while she watched the gems fall!" Hope and Faith turned to see Patience gathering as much force gems as she could. They all crossed the bridge, waited for Patience to grab two more floating gems, watched Patience fall down the chasm trying to get the gems and reappear next to them, then moved on to the next room.

"This is a room?" Hope asked. "All it has is a staircase." Alright, fine, skip the 'room' part. Anyway, the four went down the staircase into an area that had doors open on both sides and a mage laughing to himself sitting in between them. Or was it a "her"? The quartet decided to try the left side first, and ended up in the same place.

"Back again, are we?" the mage laughed.

"Um, okay, could you not talk to us?" Faith asked as they went through the right door.

"That was rude!" Hope scolded as Link and Patience got the force gems out of the treasure chests that were there.

"I don't care!" Faith said. "I just want to get out of this cave!" They left the empty chests and emerged in a room like the first, except there was no mage. After trying to get through the underground maze numerous times, they finally got it right and climbed some stairs into another empty room. All there was were two levers on each side of a closed door. Trying the left lever first, the only thing that happened was a treasure chest appearing. Patience, obviously thinking it was a force gem (honestly, if you didn't figure that out for yourself, I don't know where you've been these past eight chapters!), opened it, and got a heart container instead. The door opened when they pulled the right lever. Going into the next room, they came face-to-face with the boss.

"YOU?" Patience exclaimed.

"You sound so surprised," Shadow Link smirked. "I told you I'd be back."

"Well, yeah, I know," Patience said, scratching her head in thought. "I just thought that bosses were supposed to be smarter."

"Good help must be hard to find," Hope commented dryly.

"You do know that the main villain always sends his weaker minions to try to beat the hero first, right?" Faith smirked at Shadow Link.

"Shut up!" he yelled as he threw a bomb at them. Hope pulled out her shield and deflected it. Link went right after his evil twin and tried to slash at him with his sword. Shadow Link jumped up and threw another bomb down on them. Everyone held up their shields.

Everyone, that is, except Patience.

She had decided to try a different approach. Standing under it, Patience caught the bomb, and then threw it at Shadow Link when he landed. Stunned by the explosion, Link then went in and hit him with the sword. Shadow Link tried to get away, but he ran right into Hope's sword.

"That's it!" he shouted. Jumping away, he transformed himself into an exact copy of Link, green tunic and all. Only the real Link would be able to hurt him. Unfortunately, Shadow Link kept tossing bombs and wouldn't let Link near him.

"TIME OUT!" They stopped fighting and turned around. "Cool, it actually worked."

"What, Faith?" Link glared at her. Shadow Link looked bored.

"Hang on; I need to aim this right." She had an arrow out.

"You do know I'll just move out of the way, right?" Shadow Link asked, tossing a bomb up in the air and then catching it. She gave him a sly smile.

"Oh, I'm not aiming for you." The arrow soared through the air and hit the bomb. Again, the explosion stunned Shadow Link. The real Link started hitting him like there was no tomorrow. Soon, Shadow Link threw a big green force gem out as a sign of surrender.

"I'll be back," he growled. He swirled around and went into the ground like before.

"Is everybody okay?" Hope asked.

"I'm fine!" Patience grinned as she picked up the force gem, finally powering up their swords. Link and Faith just nodded.

"Come on," Link said and led them into the very last room. The barrier of darkness was in it. After destroying it, the four were instantly transported outside.

* * *

**Krista:** Yeah, I don't think this was one of my funnier chapters. I gotta play the next level to try and get ideas. If anybody has any, feel free to put them in your review. Cya! 


	10. Hyrule Castle Pt One

**Krista:** Yay, I'm back! I know, took awhile, I apologize. But I do other stuff than write fanfiction, so it's not like I was just lazy (that's only part of the reason). Thanks to everyone who reviewed, including a couple of my best friends Mishyness and Bla. Anyway, here's chapter ten.

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_**Chapter Ten:**_** Hyrule Castle: Part One**

"Ahhh, the sun!" Patience rejoiced, dancing around in circles.

"It feels so good to be out of that cave," Hope said. Faith, however, was shielding her eyes against the sun.

"Actually, I think I like the dark better," she remarked. Link was looking around, apparently confused.

"Any of you guys know why we're in front of Hyrule Castle?" he asked.

"I do." Kaepora Gaebora had flown down on top of a wooden structure that seemed made for him.

"Grrrr..." Link turned around to see Hope and Patience holding Faith back. The middle sister had her fists clenched and looked like she was about to hit someone.

"Hurry up and talk to the owl, will ya?" Hope told Link.

"Yeah!" Patience agreed. "Before she breaks our grip!" After about fifteen minutes, Kaepora Gaebora took a breath from talking and left. Link turned to see Faith taking on both Hope and Patience in a practice sword fight.

"The owl finally stop talking?" Faith asked with a small scowl.

"Yes," Link answered. "Why do you hate him?"

"I don't know. He just rubs me the wrong way!"

"What'd he say?" Hope asked.

"He said there's a maiden trapped in the castle." Link waited for the girls to respond. When they didn't, he added, "That's basically it."

"It took him fifteen minutes to say THAT?" Patience exclaimed. "What'd he do, say each syllable five times slower?!"

"Knock it off, Patience!" Hope said. "Let's just go save the maiden all right?" The rest nodded their agreement and went closer to the castle. Then they ran and hid in some bushes when two guards at the top of the side towers threw bombs at them.

"Alright." Link turned to the girls. "We need a plan--wait, where's Hope?" Faith and Patience pointed behind him. In the area between the side towers and in front of the closed castle gate was Hope. The other three went into the clearing to watch her better.

"Hey boys!" Hope yelled to the guards. "Want to see how well you aim? I bet you guys couldn't hit the broad side of this castle if it was two feet in front of you!"

"Is she crazy?!" Link was about to get her out of there, but her sisters held them back.

"Chill dude," Patience said. "Hope always knows what she's doing."

"Most of the time she does, anyway." Link glared at Faith for her comment. The guards were throwing bomb after bomb at Hope, who was doing various dance steps while dodging them. Finally she got tired of it and caught two bombs. She threw them to the sides of the towers to burn all the grass. Then she used the next two to make the guards disappear in smoke. In other words, she destroyed them.

"FORCE GEMS!" Patience ran around where the grass used to be to the collect the small blue gems. When she went to the left side of the left tower, Link and her sisters heard her scream. Running to where they last saw her, they found a small staircase leading to an underground passageway. They went down the stairs and saw Patience sitting on the ground, rubbing her head.

"Patience, are you okay?!" Hope ran toward her youngest sister, her eyes shining with worry.

"I can't believe you missed those stairs!" Faith said, shaking her head as if disgraced.

"You would too if you were walking backwards to collect gems!" Patience retorted.

"...I'm not even going to ask why you were walking backwards," Faith stated.

"I'm actually curious about the answer to that," Link spoke up. Patience smiled at him.

"I like to do things differently," she said.

"...I see." Link cleared his throat. "Well, at least you found out where to go next." Patience stuck her tongue out at Faith.

"See? Not everything I do is stupid!"

"That's up for debate," Faith muttered. The quartet made their way through the underground passage and ended up on the top of the right side tower. After hitting the crystal switch to open the castle gate, Link, Faith, and Patience jumped off and landed to the side of the tower. Hope didn't.

"C'mon, Hope!" Patience told her. "It's not that far!"

"Yes it is!" the oldest sister argued.

"Let me guess, she's scared of heights," Link said.

"Bingo," Faith answered. Then she looked at Hope. "Hey, you remember those stupid bus evacuation drills they make us do in school? Pretend it's one of those!"

"Yeah," Patience agreed. "Just sit down and slide off!"

"If worse comes to worse, I'll catch you!" Link shouted to Hope. Faith raised an eyebrow at him.

"Is she supposed to be comforted by that?" she asked. Link glared at her. To Hope, she said, "Just come down and get it over with!" Hope nodded a little and tried the sitting and sliding method. Link caught her as he said he would. Hope gave out one of the biggest sighs of relief one would ever hear.

"Thanks," she said. "Come on, let's get going." The four walked into the now open castle gate...only to get locked into an area with about two dozen enemy soldiers.

"Just perfect," muttered Link. Faith, Hope, and Patience got out their swords and shields as Link did the same. Then they watched the enemy soldiers march up and down the area for about ten minutes.

"Do they even notice us?" Faith asked, sounding a bit aggravated.

"YO!" Patience yelled. All the soldiers turned and started to surround them. Patience smiled sheepishly. "They do now."

Link and Hope glared at her before getting locked in the fight. Faith, on the other hand, gave an evil grin before jumping in the fray.

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**Krista:** Done! I know, not much happens in this chapter. It's just basically to introduce the next level. R&R please! 


	11. Hyrule Castle Pt Two

**New Disclaimer: **I also don't own anything from Lampchop. Anybody remember that show?

**Krista: **I am so sorry for not updating! Thanks to everyone and anyone who read and reviewed the last chapter. Here's the long-overdue chapter eleven.

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_**Chapter Eleven: **_**Hyrule Castle: Part Two**

"Well, that was fun," Link said sarcastically after the group defeated the enemy soldiers. Faith thought he was serious.

"Yeah, it was," she agreed.

"At least you got a heart container," Hope pointed out to Link. Patience was skipping ahead, happy that they got a force gem worth 300 Force. The four walked into an empty outdoor area right in front of the castle entrance. Patience was walking around exploring on her own around the left side of the castle entrance. Link noticed something sticking out of a bush on the right.

"I wonder what that is." He went over toward the object. Hope followed him when she knew she was able to keep an eye on Patience at the same time.

"It better be something to help us open this door," Faith said, while kicking the castle's door. The object happened to be a lever and, after Link pulled it, opened the door.

"Come on, Patience," Hope called. "Link got the door open!" She followed Faith inside, but Link waited for Patience.

"Hang on!" the youngest called out from behind a tree on the left. "I'm trying to pull a lev--got it!" Right after she successfully yanked the lever, Patience appeared from behind the tree. Looking around, she seemed disappointed. "I thought force gems would fall out of the sky if I pulled it."

"It was probably a decoy. The other one opened the door," Link explained. "Come on, your sisters are already inside." Patience was about to catch up to him, but out of thin air, two guards appeared and started going for her.

"AHH!" Patience started wildly swinging her sword. "Link, kill them!" she ordered while pulling her shield in front of her. Link rolled his eyes and pulled out his sword on Patience's attackers.

While Link and Patience were killing the guards outside, Faith and Hope were fighting two guards in the entrance hall of the castle. The hall was basically one room with stairs separating the lower part of the room and a higher walkway leading to doorways on each side of the room. On the lower part, there was also a doorway to the right. When they defeated their enemies, Hope turned to Faith.

"Are Patience and Link still outside?" she asked.

"They'll catch up," Faith said. "In the meantime, let's go see what's in here!" She ran into the lower right doorway. Hope glanced at the main entrance door, then ran after Faith.

"If you stayed calm and didn't swing your sword around like a maniac, then you'll probably be able to battle more efficiently," Link told Patience as they walked into the castle.

"If I don't swing my sword, how am I supposed to hit anything?" Patience asked. She swung her weapon as a practice run and accidentally broke a pot that was against the wall.

Link shook his head and sighed. "No, that's not what -- Where are your sisters?"

"Maybe they went up the stairs!" Patience suggested, dashing up said stairs. Link followed and found her staring at a locked door. "I don't think they went in there," she said.

"Well, obviously!" Link exclaimed. "It's locked!" Patience glared at him.

"I can see that!" She noticed the doorway at the end of the left walkway. "C'mon, let's check in here!" With that, she bolted toward it.

"Patience, wait!" Link yelled, but she was already gone. He groaned and muttered, "Goddesses, help me," and ran after her.

"I can't believe all we had to do was push the block and we get 100 force gems," Hope commented. She and Faith walked back into the main hall.

"Patience will be happy," Faith said. "Are they still outside?" she asked when they didn't see them in the hall. Hope checked from the main entrance and shook her head.

"Faith, they're not there!" she exclaimed, then she noticed the stairs. "Maybe they thought we went on the top walkway."

"Hope, I'm worried," Faith admitted. Her older sister smiled at her.

"Don't be," Hope said. "Link's with Patience, so I'm sure nothing's going to happen to her." Faith stared at her older sister.

"Are you crazy?!" she asked. "I'm not worried about what'll happen to Patience! I'm worried about what _she'll_ do to Link and this place!"

Hope looked puzzled. "What? Why?" Faith gaped at her in disbelief.

"Did you forget that there's a fire rod in this castle?"

Hope was quiet for a minute. "Oh God, we gotta find them!" She ran up the stairs, Faith right at her heels. Looking left and right of the locked door, Hope turned to Faith. "Which way?"

"Let's try right," Faith answered, leading the way. They emerged onto an outdoor wall. Walking along, the two picked up a few small red force gems and went into a guardhouse by its back door.

"Bow and arrows!" Faith grabbed her favorite weapon from the pedestal in the upper right-hand corner of the room. "You can have the bombs," she told Hope and pointed to the bomb bag across the room. Hope took her new weapon and looked toward the front door of the guardhouse.

"Well, that's stupid!" she commented. "Who builds a chasm right in front of the door?" Faith peered through the door and got caught by Hope before she fell in the hole.

"What's that black thingy all the way down on that walkway?" she asked.

"Maybe it's a switch," Hope answered. "Try hitting it with an arrow." Faith obliged and her arrow connected with the crystal switch, making a bridge over the chasm so they could go through the front door. The two sisters walked out along the ledge and noticed a little courtyard next to them. Faith jumped down and looked up at Hope, who was still on the ledge.

"Come on, Hope!" she called up. "It's not that far!"

"Why are there so many jumps?" Hope complained. Her younger sister put her hands on her hips.

"Look, if I had to swim, you can drop down!" she said. "There are a few levels where we have to swim for a good amount of them. And why weren't you complaining when we had to shoot out of those cannons?"

The eldest paused for a moment to answer. "Well, I suppose going up is different from jumping down..."

Faith sighed. "Look, if you don't come down, I'm stranded!"

"Why would you be stranded?" Hope asked.

"Because you have the bombs!" Faith yelled. "Now get down here!" Hope swallowed and, after a few minutes delay, dropped down and landed on her feet. "See, was that so hard?" Faith asked.

"Almost as hard as swimming." Hope smiled while Faith glared at her.

"I wonder how you're going to be in the Realm of the Heavens level," Faith said as she took a small red and a big green force gem from a couple of treasure chests.

"Why do you say that?" Hope and Faith hid behind part of a fence to avoid getting hit with a bomb blast. Faith answered as they walked into the new opening of the castle wall.

"Because that level is on clouds." The new room had two cannons on either side of it. Hope waited as Faith went to the right cannon and used it to reach the alcove that contained a key. Jumping down, Faith handed the key to Hope, knowing she herself would probably lose it.

"Well, during that level, I'll just cling to my brave little sister," Hope said sweetly as they took the other cannon all the way to the top. As they emerged back on top of the castle's outside wall, Faith gave Hope a response.

"Like heck you are!" she scoffed and they walked back toward the main hall.

_**Meanwhile, somewhere on the left side of the castle...**_

"This is the song that doesn't end, 'cause it goes on and on my friend! Some people started singing it, not knowing what it was. And they'll continue singing it forever just because. This is the song that doesn't end, 'cause it goes on and on my fri--"

"Patience, will you _please_ stop singing that?!" Patience looked at Link strangely.

"You don't like Lampchop's songs?" she asked.

"Who, or what, the heck is Lampchop?" he asked, sounded exasperated, then shook his head. "Don't answer; I don't want to listen to an explanation." The two stopped walking along the outdoor walkway and found a guardhouse without a front door.

"Look it, Link!" Patience ran over to a low wall on the right next to the guardhouse. The wall was low enough to look over, but not climb over. "There are force gems over there!"

"Too bad we can't get to them," Link said. "They're behind a guardhouse with no way to get in."

"I see the back door from here," Patience mentioned, then walked around to the front. "Alright, we're gonna try ramming a front door into this thing! Ya ready Link?"

"No," he said firmly. "There's probably something else that makes a front door appear." _Otherwise, it'd be pretty stupid to have a guardhouse at all!_

He noticed on the left side of the guardhouse there were three blocks, but one was not connected to the other two. _If it worked in the cave..._he thought and pushed the lone block next to the others. Patience, who had resorted to trying to cut a way into the guardhouse with her sword, fell into it as the front door appeared. Link heard her startled cry from the outside change into a delightful scream when he stepped in after her.

"Yay, my fire rod came back to me!" She started hugging it and danced around the room. Suddenly, she stopped. "Who should I test this out on?"

"Not me!" Link exclaimed hastily. "Go outside and play with it after you get the force gems."

"You're actually giving me permission to _play_ with it?" Patience's eyes widened.

"Uh, well..."

"Awesome!" and she was gone. Link shook his head, then slightly jumped when he saw a good-sized flame go soaring past the back door. Looking around, he found a bow and arrows and took them for himself.Then he noticed a few treasure chests on the ground. Not daring to go outside while she was using her fire rod, Link called out to Patience instead.

"Hey, there are a couple of treasure chests in here! You want to--" Patience was there and opening a chest before Link finished the sentence. She squealed when she got a big green force gem, but just handed Link the blue bracelet.

"You can have that," she said disappointedly. "Ooo, switches!" She stepped on one of the switches and motioned for Link to do the same with the other one.

Instead, he crossed his arms across his chest. "What if a couple of guards show up because we pressed them?"

Patience mimicked the way he was standing and retorted, "And what if it drops the key to that locked door we passed?" About a second after they pressed the switches, she cried out, "FORCE GEM!" and ran out through the front door. Link followed and saw her pick up a big blue gem. He looked around and sighed.

"Guess there's nothing else here," he said. "Let's go back the other way and find your sisters."

"Okay!" Patience grinned and pulled her fire rod back out. She jumped when Link yelled at her.

"Don't you dare play with that thing near me!"

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**Krista:** Well, there it is. I had fun making them separate into two groups! Please R&R! Bye! 


	12. Hyrule Castle Pt Three

**'Nother Random Disclaimer: **The original song "It's Raining Men" is copyrighted to its respectful owners. (I doubt I really need this, but just in case.)

**Krista: **...Huh, seems as if I returned from the dead. Thank you to _everyone_ who continued to send positive reviews years after this story went on a sudden hiatus. Please enjoy these overdue chapters, and review at your leisure.

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_**Chapter Twelve**_**: Hyrule Castle: Part Three**

"Look, there they are!"

"Thank the goddesses...." Link watched Patience run toward her older sisters, who were coming down the opposite way toward the locked door than he. He smiled slightly as Hope ran to meet her youngest sister, her short hair flying behind her.

"Omigod, Patience, you're not hurt, are you?" Hope asked, almost shaking the young girl by her shoulders as Hope inspected her. Faith caught up, nodding to Link and Patience before slipping the key out of Hope's pocket and unlocking the door in front of them.

"I'm fine," Patience responded, breaking away from Hope's hold, feeling a bit dizzy from the shakes. "We didn't even meet any bad dudes! And look!" She held up her weapon triumphantly. "Link let me have the fire rod!"

Link did a double-take at Patience's claim as Faith's narrowed eyes glared at him. "Wha--No, I didn't! You _took_ it!"

But Patience hardly heard him. Instead, she just gave him a quick smile before bouncing off after Hope into the new hallway. Faith rolled her eyes as she cut in front of the Hylian to follow.

"Sure, blame the innocent kid," she muttered.

"B-but, she--Oh, whatever!" Link grumbled as he followed the girls through the bare corridor and heard Hope stifle a scream beyond the stairs. As he emerged in the outdoor clearing, his eyes widened as he saw Faith darting around a soldier heavily armored who was swinging a giant spiked ball from a chain. Link's delicate ears swore that he heard her growling under her breath in frustration, but his eyes trailed over to the side where Patience was kneeling beside Hope.

"I'm okay, I'm okay," the eldest said through gritted teeth, shattering the illusion of her being fine, while gripping her left knee. "The jerk just caught me with the ball, that's all."

"And the nerve of him!" Patience shook a fist toward the soldier. Of course, his attention was all on the red-clad girl practically hopping like a rabbit in front of him, but that didn't stop Patience from yelling at him. "The armor protects him from my fire rod!"

Link watched as Faith dashed in for another slash at the soldier before unsheathing his own sword and rushing behind the enemy.

"C'mon!" Faith taunted. "Show me how you dance!"

The soldier said nothing and revved up his chain for another throw at the girl. Link ducked and rolled from the spiked ball as it neared his head. He heard Patience giggle near one of the walls, and he realized that his hat had fallen off once again. With a silent vow to buy a comb _somewhere_, the young man took a flying leap at the enemy at the same time as Faith did.

"Ow!" A look of disbelief and irritation crossed Faith's face as she dropped her sword and looked at her arm. Looking up at Link, she glared at him and snapped, "What was that for? We're on the same side!"

"You're not the only one who got hurt," Link said, making sure his shoulder was fine. Luckily for the heroes, the soldier had also gotten hit with their swords, disappearing from their sight after the final impacts.

"Giant force gem!" Of course, Patience had to claim the green gem as her own prize, despite the fact that she did nothing. Before anyone could comment, a shrill whistle sounded and large doors opened on either side of the clearing. Immediately, dozens of enemy soldiers flooded into the clearing, aiming their swords at the quartet.

Faith cursed under her breath as she picked up her sword, and a fearful squeak came from Patience as the youngest hid behind Link.

"Patience and I will take care of this." Hope limped slightly over to the other three. Patience squeaked again.

"Hope, have you forgotten how to count?" she asked. "Let the two who _like_ fighting take care of them!"

"Just do as I say and you'll be fine," Hope said with a calm voice, staring at the enemies. "Link, Faith, please move back." Faith immediately obeyed her older sister, taking a few steps back, but kept a tight grip on her sword as her eyes gazed at the soldiers. Link, however, hesitated.

"What about your knee--"

"We'll be fine," the eldest repeated, backing up slightly as the soldiers came closer. "Patience, get over here with your fire rod out!"

The youngest crept out from behind Link, but a maniac-like grin swept over her face as she got her weapon ready.

The eldest sister took out her bomb bag and, with a grin toward Patience, said, "I need you to light these for me." With that, Hope threw the bomb toward the large mass of soldiers.

Patience just stood at her spot for a moment, blinking, as she comprehended what she was supposed to do. After a few seconds and an "ah-HA!", a fireball emitted from the rod's end and flew through the air toward the bomb. As it lit, the bomb exploded, causing a chain reaction within the soldiers and destroying quite a few at once.

Link watched the display of awkward fireworks until an arrow whizzed by his head. Glancing back and forth behind and in front of him, he noticed Faith shooting the stranglers of enemies after the bombs went off. He spotted one going a bit too close to Hope and Patience, and whipped out his bow as well. Within the next few minutes, all the enemies had been defeated.

"It's raining gems! Hallelujah! It's raining gems! Amen!" Patience darted around, singing at the top of her lungs as she collected the force gems that descended from the sky. Never missing a beat, she also tossed a couple of healing hearts toward the other three as she scooped around the area.

"Thanks, Patience," Hope said, flexing out her knee to make sure it didn't hurt anymore. Patience just waved her hand and continued to pick up the other gems. Soon enough, the quartet's swords began to glow saffron and orange once more.

"Let's keep going," Link said, grabbing his hat and leading the way north and out of the clearing. Faith grabbed Patience's arm to make sure she kept up, ignoring the protests coming from the youngest.

"Aw, c'mon, there are still a couple of small green ones--Ooo, pretty lights!" Patience's eyes widened as she spotted the icy-blue, electric barrier that discouraged entering the central part of the castle.

"Look out--!" At Hope's voice, Faith yanked Patience from her spot and dived toward the left as an enemy's bomb exploded at the place they were just standing on. They glanced across the way at Link and Hope standing near the right. Although Faith was ready to make a dash across the walkway to team up with her older sister and Link, Patience glanced around behind her.

"Hey, what's that?" With that, Patience darted down the left pathway, leaving the other three. Link saw Faith's mouth move in what was probably a silent curse before she ran after her sister.

"...Shall we see what's on this end, then?" he asked Hope after the two stared at the other girls disappearing in the opposite direction.

She glanced at him. "Well...sure...They'll be fine, right?" she asked for reassurance as she followed Link.

He smiled. "With Patience's energy and Faith's temper, I'm sure they will be." The pair spotted a few soldiers in the outdoor corridor. Link unsheathed his sword, but was stopped from rushing toward the enemies by a shockwave.

He felt Hope's slim hand on his arm to try to steady him as he stumbled backwards. Shaking his head, he glared around the corridor, noting that the soldiers didn't even notice them yet. Hope tapped him on the shoulder and, when he looked back at her, she pointed up toward a higher ledge.

There was Shadow Link, pounding on the ground like there was no tomorrow with a hammer. The dark young man grinned insanely as his crimson eyes saw Hope and Link.

"Only two of you?" Shadow Link taunted. "What happened to the younger women?" He gave neither Hope nor Link time to answer as his hammer disappeared in darkness. "No matter; I'm sure they're occupied." With a dry chuckle, he whirled around in a mass of shadows and ran away.

"What did he mean by _that_?"

Link heard the worry in Hope's voice as his sword shot a beam of energy out at the few soldiers milling about. "They'll be fine, Hope," he said. "You know they've got a lot of fight in them." The last soldier disappeared as he -- it? -- fell. "Besides, we'll catch up to them after we figure out what's over here."

However, all the pair found was a long lever that wouldn't budge with their efforts.

"You were saying?" Hope muttered, leaning against the steadfast lever and panting slightly.

"Okay, fine. Obviously we need more man-power to pull this," Link said. He caught the look Hope gave him. "Err...more _woman-_power? Whatever, you know what I mean! After exploring their side of the castle, they'll come over to join up with us."

Hope shook her head, a faint look of amusement on her face. "Knowing my sisters, they're probably saying the same thing about us at this moment."


	13. Hyrule Castle Pt Four

_**Chapter Thirteen**_**: Hyrule Castle: Part Four**

"Patience, what you saw better be good--Oh, no..." Faith groaned as she caught up with her younger sister.

"Yeah, I'm thrilled to see him, too," Patience said, her tone a cross between disappointment and irritation. "I thought the shine of his sword was a force gem..."

"Come now, ladies," Shadow Link said, a malicious grin on his features. "Surely you missed me?"

"Just as much as I miss having pneumonia," Faith retorted.

"Hey, you probably have force gems, right?" Patience's eyes gleamed, taking out her sword in a bout of bravery. With a flourish of her blade, and promptly almost cutting Faith's hair off, the young girl charged at the dark male.

Shadow Link just chuckled and leaped effortlessly away from the sword. A trapdoor opened beneath Patience's feet as she ran at him, making her scream as she dropped into darkness.

"Patience?!" Faith stopped short from the trapdoor as it closed back up. However, she could still hear her younger sister's loud voice.

"Faith? Where are you? Where am _I_?! Faith, come get me! It's dark down here--What's this? Hey, is this a cannon--AHHH!" Patience soon came flying out of a second door behind Faith, her arms flapping as if trying to fly. "Faith, catch me--Oof!"

Faith pushed her sister off of her and turned her glaring gaze to Shadow Link. As he laughed, she nocked an arrow in her bow and let it soar. She was oddly satisfied at hearing Shadow Link's laughter turn into curses.

Patience had regained awareness of her surroundings and grinned as she saw Shadow Link disappear, leaving behind a big green force gem.

Faith sighed and rolled her eyes as Patience once again fell through the trapdoor as she had tried to run over it to grab the gem. The older girl walked close to the south wall to avoid the door and took the gem instead. A thud behind her signaled that Patience had emerged above ground again.

"Hey, it disappeared!"

"Or I took it," Faith said, inspecting some black crystal-like switches nearby. "Walk close to the south wall to avoid the trapdoor--"

"Ooo, these look cool!" Faith jumped, startled at Patience suddenly being next to her. If Patience had been able to steer clear of the trapdoor, why didn't she do that in the first place?

The older one decided not to ask as Patience hit a switch with her sword. She frowned as its green light faded out after a second. "Aww...It looks like they need new batteries..."

"Hyrule doesn't even have electricity," Faith responded. "I think they all need to be triggered at once. I'll take the two top ones, you take the bottom. On the count of three, we'll do the spin attack with our swords to get them all at once. Ya ready?"

Patience had been just tapping one of the crystals, easily amused at the green glow fading in and out. "...Huh? Did you say something?"

With a growl under her breath, Faith explained everything again and soon the two were into position. After a few tries and curses, all the crystals were lit and a rumble shook the wall. Patience gasped.

"Faith, we just tore down part of the _wall_!"

"And revealed a secret corridor," the older one said, unfazed at the idea of destroying part of a royal castle. She cut down some of the pots close to the north wall, revealing an oddly-shaped switch. "Patience, I need you to stand on here."

"Huh? Oh, sure." Patience moved away from the horned statues that she had been inspecting and stepped on the switch.

"Good," Faith said, just barely spotting a skylight opening on the adjacent roof. "Now, I need you to stay there." Ignoring Patience's protests, Faith went into the door that was nearby. She ascended the staircase that was in the small room and found two switches. The first she tried opened up the door in front of her, and she abandoned the second one for the moment. As she stepped through the door, darkness surrounded her.

She took a sharp inhale of air and yelled, "Patience, what are you doing out there?!"

"I got lonely--Whoa, why is it so dark in here?"

"Because you stepped off the switch!"

"Is that what that was for? Alright, alright, I'll go back out there and stand on it! I'll even pose like those statues!"

Faith sighed and waited for the lights to turn on again. A feminine voice came out of the darkness as the girl waited.

"Who...Who is it? Who's there?"

The girl didn't answer, unsure as to how to respond. However, as the room turned bright again, Faith was suddenly wishing for the dark to come back. The green creature in front of her seemed to have but one eye, while the other was closed as if stitched shut, and inhuman arms and legs.

Faith was actually speechless and realized that going through this level a dozen times when she had played the game never allowed her to really think about how this creature looked. The lights flickered on and off a few times as the creature looked down, seemingly abashed, from Faith's stare for a moment before looking back up at the human.

"You...You're not with those fiends who have taken over the castle, are you?" the creature asked. "Please, would you help me?"

"Well...Uh, sure...?" Some thought in the back of her head pestered Faith, telling her that this creature needed to follow them.

"Hey, Faith, I--Eep!" Patience clung to Faith's arm, peeking out around her older sister at the creature, wide-eyed. "What is _that_?!"

Faith groaned and rolled her eyes. "Very tactful, Patience," she muttered sarcastically.

The creature stood up. "I heard the maidens' cries and ran here to find the castle a nest of fiends. They captured me and split me in two. That's why I look so horrible right now!" she explained. "Please, I beg of you. Reunite my two halves; make me whole again!"

Patience blinked before slowly coming out from behind Faith. "You kind of look like a sick fish," she stated.

"Patience!" Faith scolded, idly realizing that she was beginning to sound like Hope. To the creature's plea, the older sister said, "Any idea where this other half is?"

Of course, Faith already had an idea of where the other half was. However, she was just curious as to what the creature would respond since the words out of the creature's mouth had been the script from the video game.

The creature, though, just shrugged helplessly. "That I do not," she responded. "We were separated right after we were cut."

"Alright..." Faith nodded. She suddenly glanced at Patience. "How are you in here with the lights still on?"

Patience grinned. "I moved one of those statues onto the button so I could join you! Aren't I smart?"

Faith blinked and just nodded slowly, unsure if she believed that her little sister had moved a statue on her own. Perhaps those statures were hollow, or something.

"Okay, let's go find Link and Hope," Faith said instead of asking questions. To the creature, she added, "Stay close."

Within a few minutes, the trio had passed the glowing barrier, dodging bombs thrown at them from the guard soldiers as they ran. They emerged in the corridor to find Link and Hope leaning against a giant lever. Link grinned as he spotted them.

"See, Hope, I told you they would..." he faltered as the creature shyly stepped up next to Faith, "...find us..." With a frown and a swift movement, Link began to bring up an arrow at the creature. Hope, however, placed a hand on his arm.

"Glad to see that you caught up," the eldest said to her sisters. Glancing at the creature by Faith's feet, she said, "Who's your friend?"

Patience spoke up. "She's someone who needs to reunite with her other half." Passionately, she continued with, "The fiends here separated her and her significant other! It's a tragic love story, really."

Link raised an eyebrow slightly, either from Patience's added commentary or from being uncertain as to how anyone can tell what gender the creature was. However, he got his answer as the creature coughed lightly for attention.

"N-no, I'm separated from my literal other half," she clarified.

"And it's inside the castle somewhere," Faith said briskly. "You two need help pulling out that lever?"

The until-now-forgotten lever pulled out quite easily with the quartet working together. The four, with the creature in tow, entered the new room and went into the back to find a cracked wall. Hope used a bomb to break the walls that blocked their way, and the same feminine voice of the creature next to them spoke from the dungeon.

"Oh, happy day!" The second creature stood up and went next to its other half. "Now, at last, we can merge as one, and I can return to my true form!"

The quartet paused for a moment, waiting for the two to reunite. However, the halves just stared back at the four before one said, "Please take me to the barrier that blocked your way. I'll do my best to aid you on your journey!"

Link shrugged to the girls and led the way out again, the quartet wondering why the heck the creatures didn't just merge right then and there. As the barrier came into view, the two creatures darted in front of the group. In a flash of light, the two forms became one floating individual. She shimmered beautifully; her silver and white colors practically made her look translucent.

"I didn't think I would ever be allowed to reclaim my true form as a Great Fairy again," she said, her voice much softer than her previous counterparts. "Thank you so much, brave ones."

Another shrill whistle sounded, and a few more dozen soldiers swarmed in from across the barrier. Swords emerged from their sheaths as the group prepared to fight, but the Great Fairy just gave them a smile.

"I'll take care of this." Floating higher on invisible wings, the Great Fairy twirled while chanting an unrecognizable language. Suddenly, large bolts of lightning crashed to the earth, eliminating all the enemies one by one. Hope and Patience both gasped, the youngest hanging onto the older one's arm at hearing the small screams from the falling soldiers. Link's mouth was open in shock and awe at the Great Fairy's power, while Faith just raised her eyebrows at the event, apparently only a mildly impressed.

"So this is the barrier that blocked your way?" the Great Fairy asked, gazing at the electric fence that blocked the way into the center of the castle. The quartet remained speechless, but the lack of response didn't seem to daunt the Great Fairy. "Allow me to remove it."

The Great Fairy just waved her arms and the barrier faded out with a glimmer of electricity. She turned to Link, seemingly only talking to him.

"I'll let all of my friends throughout Hyrule know..." she began to say. "'If you run into four travelers with one face, tend to their weariness and ease the burden of their travels.'"

The sisters glanced at each other at her words, Faith's mouth open as she was about to protest. However, the Great Fairy continued to speak.

"There is a tradition that young, noble gentlemen rescue damsels in distress. And so, I leave the well-being of the maidens in your hands," she said. With another twirl, she disappeared while saying, "Take care!"

Faith was the first one to speak. "Okay, yeah, that cut thing must have _really_ affected her eyesight. Not only are we _not_ 'young, noble gentlemen,' we look nothing like this dork!" she said, ending her speech as she pointed to the oblivious-for-the-moment Link.

"She didn't look much better to me in her normal form," Patience said, walking into the newly opened door. "Didn't she look ugly to you guys? Either that, or she's just really old."

"I don't think Hope or I could give you a fair response to that," Faith answered, walking after her little sister. With a glance at Link, she added in amusement, "The only _male_ here seems to have a different opinion, though."

Link blinked at hearing Faith say his name, idly realizing that he had been staring at the spot in the sky that the Great Fairy had disappeared. "Huh?"

Hope laughed. "Don't worry your head over it," she said, dragging him through the open door by his arm.


	14. Hyrule Castle Pt Five

_**Chapter Fourteen**_**: Hyrule Castle: Part Five**

"Hm..." Faith was up the short staircase and looking around the room. The room seemed simple and empty, save for the traditional crimson carpet on the floor and two statues placed in the center as decorations. Patience was walking around the opposite side of the room as her older sister, eyeing the royal-blue curtains hanging around.

"I don't think the curtains match the carpet," the youngest said. She turned to grin at Faith, who returned the expression, as Link and Hope ascended the stairs. Without another word to each other, Patience whipped out her trusty fire rod and set the curtains on her side of the room ablaze. The sound of slashes and fabric tearing indicated that Faith had taken her sword to the offending drapes.

Link sighed, watching the two girls and their maniac grins. "Does anyone realize how much destruction we're causing this historical castle?" he mused. "I mean, we've smashed no doubt priceless vases, killed the lawns and gardens..."

"...Blown up walls," Hope added, fingering her bomb bag.

"Not to mention steal a countless amount of treasure from various chests." Faith's smirk was evident from her tone.

"HEY!" Patience paused in her rampage against the curtains to gaze at the others with narrowed eyes. "Force gems are always up for grabs! Finder's keepers! 'Sides, we kind of need them to power up our swords to save the world, don't we?" She glanced back at the damaged curtains and blinked at seeing a hidden entrance revealed. A second later, and she was through the entrance without another thought.

"Patience?" Hope almost looked as if she was going to run after her youngest sister, but turned around to speak to Faith. However, Faith was also nowhere in the room, and the only clue as to where the middle sister disappeared to was the pathway to another entrance that had been hidden behind a curtain. With a sigh, Hope looked to Link, who was waiting for the eldest. "Well? Who do you want to follow this time?"

The young man gave her an amused smile. "Faith or Patience...? Hothead or Wild Child...? Not much of a choice you're giving me..."

Before Hope could reply, a whoop of delight came from Patience's door, no doubt indicating that she had found some sort of force gem. Faith's voice suddenly came through her entrance as well.

"I don't care who catches up with me," she shouted. "Just make sure one of you hurries it up! The hallways lead to the roof, and there are two switches on each side of it! SO MOVE IT!"

Hope hesitated for only a moment at Faith's commanding tone. "I'll take Wild Child," she said, and practically flew through the entrance on Patience's side. Link blinked, hardly realizing what had happened, but sighed as he trudged through the door that Faith had. A battle cry greeted him, and Link brought up his sword just in time to block the enemy soldier's weapon. With a twist and a well-aimed stab, however, the soldier disappeared.

"Are you done playing?" Faith's slightly-irritated voice floated down to him, and the young man looked up to see her sitting on the ledge that separated the room into top and bottom halves.

"You could have warned me, you know," he said, ascending the staircase and catching up to her.

She gave him a crooked smile and merely agreed. "I could have." She led the way outdoors and onto the roof, pointing rather needlessly to the two switches on one side of a stone barrier.

"Faith, Link!" Patience called from the other side of the barrier, waving enthusiastically to the other two. Hope was right behind her.

"Patience, you just saw them," she said calmly. "Now get over here and step on the other switch."

As soon as the four switches were pressed, the stone barrier vanished. The four went into the next area, and were immediately ambushed by a battalion of guards. However, with the beams of energy emitting from their swords quickly took care of the opposition, and the quartet moved on.

"Whoa..." Patience went wide-eyed at the giant, horned statues and equally enormous throne in the next room. "Alright, Link, how does Zelda expect to rule from a chair that's ten times the size of her?"

"It's not _that_ big..." Link said.

"Uh, dude, _yeah,_ it is. Look at it!" The young girl began to make her way toward the throne, but screamed when the statues began to glow red and start bouncing near her. She dashed behind Hope as the eldest tossed a bomb at one, while Link and Faith shot the other with their arrows. When the statues were vanquished, Patience looked at Link.

"Well, I think you should scout the rest of the room," she said.

Link raised an eyebrow. "Why me?"

"You should do it because there may be other scary things in here and you've lived the longest."

The Hylian sighed, rubbing his temple as if he felt a headache coming on. Absentmindedly, he wondered why a headache hadn't invaded long ago. He shot a glare at Faith, who seemed to be swallowing a laugh at Patience's logic, and walked closer to the throne cautiously, keeping his delicate ears alert for any odd sounds. As he reached the majestic chair, he turned around and shrugged to the girls.

"Nothing else is coming alive to attack us," he informed them.

"And there seems to be no other door 'round here," Hope said, looking around. She glanced at her sisters, who seemed to be regarding her as if they were waiting for permission for something. "Well, go ahead."

"YAY!" Patience dashed into the center of the room with her fire rod, narrowly missing a bewildered-Link with the flame as she aimed at the curtains. However, she failed to miss the throne.

"Well, I suppose we can add 'burning the throne room down' to that list of destruction we're causing this castle..." Faith said, glancing at all the smoke curling up into the sky. She had been the first to catch her breath after the group had dived out of the hidden entrance behind the throne that was discovered after the fire ate the curtains shielding it.

"Indeed," Link agreed dryly, trying to fill his lungs with clear air. He glanced up ahead, noting that the four where on the topmost roof of the castle. As soon as everyone was set, the four cautiously walked forward into the seemingly clear rooftop.

Hope's gasp alerted the others to the swirling mass of shadows coiling up in the center of the roof. Link unsheathed his sword and tensed, ready for a fight, and soon heard the other girls do the same. He figured it was Shadow Link showing up again, but realized how wrong he was as the shadows began to take some form of a horned beast. With a mechanical laugh, the shadow beast waved his giant, dark sword and hurled a green ball of sizzling energy at the four.

"HIT THE DECK!" At Patience's sudden shout, the quartet dived to the floor, watching as the energy ball split up and rampaged over their heads in multiple pieces before disappearing.

Faith huffed as the shadow beast laughed again, wondering if this would be the same as in the game. He threw a crimson ball this time, and she jumped up to greet it, smacking the energy back toward the beast. He hit it again, causing the ball to turn blue.

Hope's eyes widened as the energy came straight at her, but she seemed to recall this part of the game. Swinging her sword, the weapon connected with the ball and sent it straight back to its maker. However, the shadow beast actually ducked, missing the energy, and the ball again exploded. The quartet dropped to the ground as well to miss the mini projectiles. As soon as the mini balls of energy disappeared, the shadow beast revved up another of the irritating balls.

Faith glanced at the other three. "I hope you all know how to play ping-pong."


	15. Just the Beginning

_**Chapter Fifteen**_**: Just the Beginning**

A sigh escaped Hope's lips as she sat a bit uncomfortably on a fairly-rough boulder by the sea. The surf seemed gentle, though, glittering under the stars in the sky, and the sounds of the crashing waves soothed her. Her blue eyes turned to glance toward Faith and Patience both sleeping on the grassy beginnings of the woods nearby. The eldest sister gave a concerned sigh at seeing a frown on Faith's face, the middle sister's brows furrowed slightly from her dreams. Despite not saying a word, it was obvious that Faith had not been happy at the idea of traveling through the sea and coast to get to the Eastern Temple. However, Hope smiled as she saw Patience all curled up next to Faith, the cut she had gotten on her arm from the battle atop Hyrule Castle healing nicely, thanks to the Blue Maiden.

A flicker of light at the corner of her eye made Hope look toward the east and saw the Blue Maiden in the form of a fairy seemingly speaking fervently with Link. Since she could not make out what the two were saying, Hope turned her eyes back to the sea, figuring that it was about the next maiden stuck in the Eastern Temple.

Or maybe he's trying to explain that he had no idea why the legendary Four Sword made his so-called counterparts female...

A star shot down from the sky, its tail of light beaming through the darkness as it fell beyond the sea's horizon. Hope's mind buzzed with everything that had happened that day, from the time her sisters and she woke up in tunics to seeing the monster atop Hyrule Castle explode with the final slash of Link's sword to watching in awe as the captive Blue Maiden emerged from her crystal prison. Had this all happened in one day? Perhaps a night had passed while they were all in that stupid cave...

Soft jingles reached the young woman's ear, and Hope turned slightly to see the Blue Maiden fly off into the night. Link watched the fairy go, his sharp eyes eventually moving up to look at the tip of the Eastern Temple in the distance. Hope wondered for an instant why the Blue Maiden could not just teleport the four to the temple; if the fairy had been able to send them to the edge of the shore from the castle, why not the temple?

The thought of the fairy intentionally making the group trudge through more evil to get to the temple on their own flew out of Hope's mind as she looked at Link. He seemed to be troubled, and she had noticed that it had begun after Faith called the energy-throwing monster "Phantom Ganon." Hope had recalled the beast in the game, and wondered if she had the same questions as Link. Like him, she also did not know the whole answer behind this mystery; she had only gotten as far in the game as she got when playing with her sisters before they got transported to this world.

Vaati was the name of the demon that was supposed to be behind all the troubles Hyrule was seeing now. Why did he use a puppet of another villain to guard the first maiden?

"Hope?" Lost in her own thoughts, the eldest sister had failed to notice Link approach. "I'm surprised to see you still awake."

She gave him a tight smile. "I was just thinking about today," she said. "Where did the Blue Maiden go?"

"She wants to try to find the easiest route to the Eastern Temple for us," he responded, leaning against the boulder next to Hope. "She has a feeling, though, that there are going to be troubles between here and the temple, and would like us to help solve them."

Hope just nodded to the explanation, and her eyes wandered back to her sisters. Patience twitched, muttered something about the "Evil Balloon-Boy," and shifted closer to Faith. The older girl stayed still as stone as her sister huddled against her, excluding the small flutter of her eyelids. Hope idly wondered if Faith was still awake.

A chuckle from beside her caused Hope to turn away from her sisters. She looked up and noticed that Link was actually watching Faith and Patience as well.

"They're exhausted, aren't they?" he asked needlessly. "Patience just conked right out as soon as she laid down." Hope just gave a small smile to Link's comment before she felt him nudge her arm.

"You must be tired as well," he said. "Why don't you go to sleep?"

The young woman didn't argue and hopped off of the boulder to go join her sisters. However, she realized that Link wasn't following and turned back around to him.

"What about you?" she asked. "Aren't you going to sleep?"

The young man nodded. "I will," he said. "I'm just going to keep watch for a while longer."

"Don't stay up too late." The three girls were not the only ones who were tired, Hope noticed. Dark circles were starting to form under the young man's eyes. A realization just struck Hope: this was just the beginning of the adventure.

"I won't, Mother." Link grinned at Hope, a twinkle in his eye. She playfully stuck her tongue out at him as she began to settle down on the ground on the other side of Patience. "G'night, Hope."

She smiled. "Good night, Link."

**

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Krista: **I know there's not much humor in this chapter, but I wanted to do something to develop the characters a bit more. I was thinking of doing a "break" chapter in between the main levels of the game. Who knows, though; I may just skip it once or twice. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed these chapters, and, again, review at your leisure. I'd love to hear questions, critique on my writing, ideas, anything you guys have in mind. 


	16. The Coast Pt One

**Krista:** Here are the next couple of chapters containing the fourth level of the game, "The Coast." Thank you to Evanescent Radiance, Epson, S-C-R-U-Bunnies, Neko-Mitsuko, and Miorochi for the positive reviews for my last four chapters. Enjoy!

* * *

_**Chapter Sixteen: **_**The Coast: Part One**

Faith muttered curses under her breath as she scanned their surroundings with the help of the sun, ignoring Hope's disapproving glances for what fell out of Faith's mouth. Hope went to high school too; she should know where Faith had picked up the interesting words.

Of course it had to be a beach. The wind gently waved off of the water's surface as the sea curled in and out upon the sand in the small distance. Oh, Faith was looking forward to this part of the adventure, that's for sure. In fact, she was looking forward to it so much that she wanted to thank the Blue Maiden for bringing them here by drowning her.

Faith sighed, chiding herself for the morbid thought as she shifted slightly atop a boulder in a vain attempt to get more comfortable. After all, there must be some reason why the stupid fairy didn't bring the whole group straight to the Eastern Temple after Hyrule Castle. The young teenager tried to remember this particular part of the game to recall some important aspect of it, but she couldn't quite put her finger on anything specific. In fact, Faith hardly believed that the coast had anything to offer them.

With another discontent sigh, she figured that having pointless parts in the adventure was part of being a hero.

_Speaking of hero..._ Faith glanced back with slightly-furrowed brows at Link, with Patience not too far away, still sleeping among the taller grasses.

"Can we wake them up yet?" she asked Hope. "We're wasting daylight."

"No," Hope said more quietly than Faith had spoken, her tone indicating that this had not been the first time Faith had asked that question. "They're both exhausted. Let them sleep."

The eldest sister watched Faith groan slightly and bury her head in her knees. Hope knew that Faith was doing her best to remain patient. However, Faith never had much luck when it came to that particular trait. Instead, Faith had always been an early-riser, ready to tackle anything in the day, and was usually the first one to start yawning whenever dusk started coming. The wait must be bothering the heck out of her.

Seeing all the water that the group would most likely have to swim through probably wasn't helping, either.

Hope returned to keeping a look-out, both for monsters, potential friends, and the Blue Maiden as Faith returned to glaring at the sea a bit ahead of them. Hope was actually worried about the Maiden, as she believed that the fairy hadn't been around since last night. Hope wished that the Blue Maiden hadn't gotten into trouble again...

She heard a rustle in the woods beyond Link and Patience behind her, and she turned at the same time as Faith hopped off the boulder with her hand on her sword's hilt. The two waited as the rustling grew louder, and Hope's heart jumped at noticing Faith ready to leap in front of Link and Patience to attack whatever the thing was. The eldest went shoulder-to-shoulder with her younger sister and the two glanced at each other as if to say, _I'm ready._

An 'Oof!' was heard, and from the woods tripped a man dressed in green with a backpack on. Hope stared as Faith's jaw dropped. It couldn't be...

"Ah, hello again!" Tingle said cheerfully. He then began to ramble about how nice it was to see them and how much luck he had collecting Force Gems. Hope grabbed Faith's arm from pulling out her sword; she was worried that her younger sister would behead the annoying man.

Because of all the noise, Patience stirred and sleepily sat up, rubbing her eyes. "Hi, Hope, Faith, Tingle," she said groggily with an unsteady smile. She suddenly frowned. "I had a really bad dream. It was--" Her eyes suddenly focused on Tingle and she leapt up, running behind Faith in a panic. "AHH, IT WASN'T A DREAM!"

That shout caused Link to finally wake up. His reaction to seeing Tingle in front of them was a mixture of all the girls'. He jumped to his feet in a startle, his hand instinctively reaching for his sword, but his eyes looked to the girls' faces only to find that the same question was etched on every visage.

Tingle had, fortunately for him, continued to speak animatedly and had missed everything that the group in front of him had just said and done. "...Be sure to read any of the 'Tingle Times' if you happen to see them! Oh, my, look at the time. I must be off, collecting more Gems! Don't follow me!"

Like before, he said his strange words "Kooloo-Limpah!" and a balloon emerged from his pack, enabling him to float away. Patience stared after him, horrified.

"B-but I...and he...He fell...A-and there was a waterfall...That must be it!" The other three were snapped out of their disbelieving trances at Patience snapping her fingers. Accusingly, she pointed in the direction that Tingle floated off. "That must be the ghost of Tingle, coming back to haunt us!"

Hope rolled her eyes at her youngest sister's explanation. "He looked solid enough," she said. "That pack of his is probably full of balloons waiting to inflate.

"Besides," she added uncertainly, "did you really want to kill him and have that guilt on your conscience?"

Patience raised an eyebrow, a smile playing on her lips. "Guilt?" she echoed. "What is this 'guilt' you speak of?"

Hope sighed while Faith snickered. Link just shook his head and motioned for the girls to follow him as he started down the coast. He swore that he heard Faith mutter, "Finally!"

"In all honesty, the guy scares me," Link admitted. "He's, what, thirty-something years old? And he dresses up to pretend he's a fairy so he can meet the real thing? And then he thinks _I'm _some sort of fairy and keeps staring at me...!"

"Maybe he has the hots for you," Patience said quite casually, slashing up dropped coconuts and scattered patches of grass for her own quest for Force Gems.

Link whipped out his own sword. "_Never_ say that again!" Patience just laughed at his so-called threat, and whooped when she spotted a switch under a spot of grass. Pressing it, the group waited for something to happen.

"Maybe it was a dud," Hope said as Patience pouted. No sooner had the words left her mouth than a giant bomb fell from the sky, a countdown ticking away in the middle of it.

"RUN FOR IT!" Patience was going to dash farther down the beach, but Faith caught her collar.

"Into the cave behind the bomb!" the middle sister shouted. Patience didn't need to be told twice, with the rest following her. A massive explosion was heard outside the cave, rattling the walls and ceiling, scattering rocks and dirt around the place.

Hope leaned against the wall, her hand over her heart. "Well...that was fun," she said sarcastically.

"BOMBS!"

With Patience's outburst, the rest jumped, ready to take cover again. However, Patience was just waving to them from further inside the cave. "Hey, guys, there are enough bomb bags for each of us."

Link blinked, amazed at how enthusiastic she seemed just now, but followed Hope and Faith to claim one of the bags. He saw that Hope was eyeing the walls around them, and her eyes spotted a prominent crack in the northern wall. With a warning motion to the others, Hope lit a bomb's fuse near the crack and it exploded to reveal another room.

"Yay!" Patience dashed over to the two treasure chests in the room, followed closely by Faith, who took one of the chests, ignoring Patience's protests over her getting a Force Gem as well. Link glanced around the other end of the cave and saw another crack similar to the one Hope had seen before. Taking a chance, he lit one of his own bombs, and the revealed hole brought the four out into the clearing where the giant bomb had attacked them.

"I wonder where that bomb came from..." Hope idly said as the quartet made their way to the water's edge.

Faith scoffed. "The shadow guy is probably lurking around here...Doesn't he like giant bombs?"

"I have no idea," Link said. "I never took the time to find out the likes and dislikes of my evil twin."

Faith didn't retort to his sarcasm, for she was busy holding up her shield to reflect a projectile that a strange, water creature spit out at her. There was a small island in the middle of the water close to the attacking creature; she could easily kill it with her sword if she swam out to the island.

Too bad she wasn't going to do that.

Patience, on the other hand, didn't like getting assaulted by random shots that were from a monster's mouth. With a rare battle cry, the youngest jumped into the sea, almost losing her sword in the process. She quickly regained herself, however, and swam like an eager dolphin to the island, slashing the closest monster to make it disappear. Hope and Faith just glanced at each other, both of them surprised at Patience's action but willing to believe that it was her love for swimming that gave her the courage.

Suddenly, a sharp nut went zooming by their heads, killing another water monster, and they turned to find Link aiming another nut with a new slingshot at a second monster. To the older girls' questioning gazes, he jerked his head in a gesture behind him.

"I found it in there," he said, killing the last monster, and Hope and Faith noticed a cave just by the water's edge. "There's another one in there, too--"

"Put your shields up!" Patience, dripping wet, ran behind Hope as they complied with her message. Sand and a few rocks attacked their shields.

Faith glared down at Patience. "...What blew up?"

The youngest gave her a sheepish smile. "I accidentally lit a bomb as I tried to open a treasure chest..." Faith stared at her, unable to comprehend _how_ her little sister did that. "But there's good news too!" Patience said. "The rest of them are really wet from swimming, so I can't make them randomly blow up anymore!"

Faith blinked at Patience's obvious pride behind that statement. "I vote that Patience gets the other slingshot," she said.

"I agree," Link said dryly, although a bit amused at these antics. Before he could blink, his slingshot was swiped out of his hands. With a sigh, he left the girls as Patience inspected her new 'toy' and grabbed the other slingshot from inside the aforementioned cave.

The quartet traveled further down the coast, the quiet being interrupted randomly by the banter between Faith and Patience whenever the latter splashed the former. Hope and Link made sure to stay behind the two to make sure they didn't kill one another and to otherwise pretend they didn't notice the flying water and empty threats. After a little while, the four spotted a red-roofed house with a fence blocking off the other side of the pathway.

"I see a back door," Hope reported. "It leads right to the path that we want to keep going."

"I'm sure they folks here won't mind if we just pass through," Link said, going up to knock on the door.

"Yeah..." Faith agreed wryly, "I'm sure they're used to strangers doing this." She glanced around the outside and added, "I'll be waiting out here," before going off around the house.

Link blinked at her departure, but shrugged to Hope as a thin, middle-aged man answered the door.

"Yes?" the man said, looking confused at the three.

_And why shouldn't he?_ Link thought with amusement. _Three random strangers dressed in the same manner except for colors just knocked on his door...We must seem pretty odd..._

"Hello, sorry to bother you," Hope said with a gentle smile. "We were just curious if we could pass through your house to get to the other side of the path."

"We have to get by," Patience piped up from Link's other side. Beaming proudly, she said, "We're on an important mission to save the world!"

_Thank the goddesses she's a cute kid_... Link noticed the smile the older man had gained at Patience's words, and the teenager idly wondered if Patience did that on purpose or if she was just being herself. The gentleman looked as if he were about to comply with their request, if only to humor Patience's claim, but he quickly sobered up.

"I'm sorry, kids," he said, sounding sincere. "However..." He glanced behind him, and Link caught the sight of a rather large woman looking as if smoke was about to come out of her ears. "My wife refuses to budge...Another young man just asked to do the same, and...she rambled on about private property and now she won't move from the path."

Link blinked at the explanation. "Uhh...Oh-kay...Thanks anyway, sir..."

"That was strange," Hope murmured as the gentleman shut the door.

"Let's catch up to Faith," Patience said, dashing around the house. "I bet she knew the fat lady was there!"

Link nodded, having a funny feeling about that as well. How did Faith know that they wouldn't have been able to go through the house? She must have had an idea of what would have happened; otherwise, why didn't she join them to ask for permission?

Sure enough, the other three found a couple of cave entrances with Faith leaning against the fence posts beside the furthest one. She gave the others a crooked-smile. "Wouldn't let you through, huh?" she asked.

Link narrowed his eyes. "You knew that would happen," he said, his voice carefully neutral. "How...?"

Faith shrugged, but a twinkle in her eyes indicated otherwise. "Just a hunch..."

"You took the treasure!" Patience glared at Faith as the youngest returned from the first cave, effectively saving her older sister from Link's additional questions.

"Well, duh," Faith responded, following Link and Hope into the other cave. "I wasn't just going to leave it there. There was a possibility of the people letting you walk through their house, you know."

The cave didn't have much except a line of four pots resting against each side wall before a rather-large chasm.

"Has anyone ever wondered where all these random pots come from?" Patience said over the sound of the pots shattering with the groups' swords.

"Nope," Faith answered carelessly, inspecting the eight switches that the same number of pots revealed. She didn't notice Patience stick her tongue out at her behind her back. "I may be going off on a limb here, but I'm going to guess that one side will allow us to cross the chasm and the other...won't."

"Brilliant deduction, Sherlock." Hope glanced at the switches and added, "Or the four correct switches could all be random..."

"That's sixteen possibilities," Link said. "I suppose it could also only be one correct switch..."

Patience's brows furrowed as she stared at the other three. "Can't we just go with the easiest answer?" she asked pleadingly. "Why are you all thinking so much? It hurts my head..." She motioned to the others, ignoring their chuckles at her comments, to join her on one side to step on the switches in unison. The instant all four switches were pressed, a stone bridge materialized across the chasm.

"What about the other set?"

Hope glanced back at Patience as she was about to follow Link and Faith across the bridge. "It's probably just a decoy, or a trap. Enemies may show up."

"But it can't hurt to try, right?" Patience smiled, trying to appear cute.

The youngest had a feeling that it wouldn't have worked on Faith, for the older sister rolled her eyes. However, to Patience's surprise, Faith was the first one off the bridge to stand on a switch.

"It could hurt if enemies show up," was all she said as she awaited the others to join her on the switches.

"That's what you're here for," Patience responded quite cheerfully as the other two came and the four switches were pressed. Instead of enemies or any other kind of trap activating, though, a big green Force Gem fell from the heavens, allowing Patience to claim it.

Finally crossing the bridge, the quartet entered a forked area in the cave. Hope and Faith opened the three available pathways, and Link was able to get a few small blue Force Gems when he inspected the left pathway. He returned to the middle ground and went to the right pathway, knowing that Hope went that way alone as her sisters had gone north.

"Link, we need you over here!" Patience's voice greeted him over a low wall that separated the room. Faith gestured to three switches by her feet.

Link rolled his eyes in good-humor as he turned around to go the other way, and said sarcastically, "Of course the way I choose doesn't need me..."

Hope giggled at his tone as he emerged in the correct part of the room. With the switches all activated, a new bridge formed so Hope could join the rest of them and they were soon out of the cave.

"I think I'd rather be in the cave than see his face," Faith said the second the quartet stepped into the sunlight once more.

A devious grin appeared on Shadow Link's face as he looked at Faith. "You know you missed me."

"Like I miss my geometry class," Faith retorted in disgust. Link dashed at his dark counterpart, and Patience was ready with her sword when Shadow Link tried to avoid Link. After a small scuffle, a big green Force Gem was surrendered to the quartet and Shadow Link disappeared once again.

"He must have been the one who got the woman protective of her property," Hope murmured as she watched the dark mass run away.

Patience glanced at Faith. "...He has the same face as Link."

Her older sister raised an eyebrow. "Yeah...? What about it?"

"You said you'd rather be in the cave than see his face," Patience reminded her. "So...Wouldn't Link's face count?"

Faith blinked, wondering how her sister caught that, and noticed that a dryly-amused Link seemed to be waiting for a response as well. They should have known that all she would do was smile, roll her eyes, and say, "Let's continue on, shall we...?"


	17. The Coast Pt Two

_**Chapter Seventeen: **_**The Coast: Part Two**

The quartet carried on, finding plenty of Force Gems to power up their swords in the next clearing, especially after Patience tripped over a stray coconut. The coconut seemed to have been plugging up a hole, and Force Gems rained down on the four as soon as it was moved by Patience's foot. Needless to say, she quickly forgot about the pain of falling after a Force Gem landed in front of her.

The next scene made Faith scowl. A small lake had dared to position itself between the group and the shore they needed to reach to move on. A lone island with a large, square switch was the only decoration in the middle of the lake, and was probably the only thing to make the spikes on the opposite shore disappear so they could continue their quest.

"Look, a whirlpool!" Patience was in the water before the others could blink. Link waited for the other two to enter the water before he followed, and marveled at how differently the three swam. Faith was basically dog-paddling as fast as she could to get to the little island, with Hope right next to her, being a bit more advanced as a swimmer. Patience resembled a fish; she could probably complete a couple of laps around the lake before the other three reached the little island!

Faith paused to catch her breath as she sat on the island before saying, "You may want to see what's down there before we step on the switch."

"Oh, yeah, there's probably some nice treasure, right?" Patience said, peering into the dark water. Link stared at Faith.

"What makes you think that?" he asked the middle sister steadily.

She stared at him evenly. "One of my hunches," she said, her tone daring him to challenge her.

"There's no harm," Hope said before Link could speak again. "I suppose it would be stupid to ask if you were staying up here, Faith...?" Her sister didn't even respond. "Okay, come on, Link, Patience."

"I'm already gone!" With a splash, Patience dived under the water with the help of the whirlpool. Link and Hope hurriedly followed to hear Faith yell, "Be careful!"

"It seems like it's rare for Faith to say something like that," Link mentioned as soon as he and the others made it into an underwater cave. He admitted that Faith's 'hunches' usually worked, but he still was _very _curious as to where these 'hunches' came from.

"There's only one thing that freaks Faith out more than the idea of swimming," Hope said, her voice gentle as she watched Patience dash ahead. "It's the idea of her loved ones drowning."

Link remained silent, unsure how to respond to that fact. He was saved from having to think of something when Patience came into view, tapping her foot impatiently in front of a couple of door openings.

"There are extra slingshots in that room," she reported. "You're probably going to need one, Hope."

"What about Faith?" the eldest asked, pausing in the threshold of the slingshot room.

"It's probably a good idea for someone to have bombs, just in case," Link said. He was suddenly yanked into the other room by Patience.

"Come on, one of your girlfriends is in here!"

"My what--?"

Hope quickly claimed one of the slingshots for her own, abandoning the drenched bomb bag, and followed the other two. She shook her head in good-humor as she understood what Patience had said. There at the end of the room was a Great Fairy, floating above a small, sparkling pool of water.

The Fairy smiled graciously at the three. "Let me aid you on your way," she said. The three slingshots flew out of their grasps and dove into the sparkling water. After a few seconds, the weapons emerged, looking slightly bigger than before. The Fairy giggled. "Please, don't hesitate to come again."

"This thing is as big as my head," Patience claimed as they walked out of the cave, inspecting the weapon. She then made her voice deeper, doing her best impression of an announcer. "Introducing, the new and improved level-two slingshot! Now able to toss nuts more rapidly than ever before!"

Link rolled his eyes at Patience's antics before diving back into the water and being followed by the other two.

"It's about time," was what greeted them as they surfaced outside once again. Faith looked more than a bit irked at sitting on a small island being surrounded by water. "Did you all get what you needed?"

"Yep!" Patience showed off the slingshot. Imitating an announcer again, she added, "It can even shoot three nuts at once!"

"Wonderful." Faith didn't sound that impressed. "Well, c'mon, let's hit the switch."

As soon as the switch clicked down, about a dozen of water monsters appeared, poking their heads over the surface and spitting projectiles at the group. Immediately, the quartet went into the cross formation, with Link, Hope, and Patience using their slingshots to destroy the monsters while Faith watched their backs with her shield. It took a few minutes for every monster to be vanquished, and the spikes on the opposite shore disappeared with the last water creature.

"Well, that was fun," Hope said as the quartet entered the water once again to get to the other shore. Within a few seconds, they were continuing on land again.

There was a clearing filled with crabs that seemed as if they couldn't make up their minds whether to run away from or attack the quartet. Faith made up their minds for them by throwing a bomb in the middle of the group, which incited the rest to dart at them. They were quickly destroyed by the powered-up swords, and Force Gems rained from the sky as the quartet's reward. Link, Hope, and Faith didn't mind Patience diving toward the biggest gem as they collected the smaller ones.

That is, until she screamed.

"AHHH, HELP!" Hope stifled her own scream of horror as she saw her youngest sister from the shoulders down engulfed by a strange, hopping monster. Link and Faith didn't hesitate to dive toward the monster, swords drawn.

"Don't hit me!" Patience said, her eyes wide as she saw the blades about to come down on the monster. Neither Link nor Faith responded as they took turns darting in and out, slicing the creature's sides. Eventually, the creature spit out Patience at Link, and tried to hop toward the other end of the clearing. As Faith gave chase with her bombs, Hope hovered around Link holding the shaking Patience.

"Are you okay? You're not bleeding, are you?" Hope asked anxiously. "Broken bones, torn muscle--"

"I-I'm okay," Patience said, her eyes still wide as she huddled in Link's arms. She suddenly frowned and glared daggers at the direction of the creature trying in vain to get away from Faith. "KILL IT, FAITH! IT ATE MY FORCE GEMS!"

An explosion responded from the other side of the clearing, and Faith soon returned with a fat purple Force Gem. Link let Patience down so she could claim it.

"Are you sure you're okay?" he asked.

"Yeah," she said, her voice returning to its perky tone while pocketing the gem. "I'll be fine."

Link smiled as Faith shook her head fondly at her younger sister's obsession with the Force Gems, and the quartet continued on, with Hope staying right by Patience's side.

"Got all your Gems back?" Shadow Link sounded bored as he sat atop a palm tree in the next clearing. The clearing was full of a labyrinth of old fences and scattered bushes and plants.

"If you were the one who sent that thing--!"

Shadow Link's chuckle at Patience shaking her fist at him, and didn't let her finish her threat. "No, I have no control over that," he said. "I have no interest in stealing your Force Gems." A malicious grin swept over his face. "My job is to slow you down...Destroy you, if possible."

Before anyone else could speak, a massive shadow ball grew in front of the quartet, reaching the size of the tree before the darkness fell from the shape and revealed a giant bomb. Shadow Link laughed as the bomb started ticking down from ten seconds, and he whirled away.

"Underground!" Hope led the way down a rocky staircase that was by the giant bomb, and the quartet made it down as an explosion shook the walls of the cave.

"I told you he liked giant bombs," Faith muttered to no one in particular.

"C'mon," Link said, leading the way back up the staircase to the earth's surface. A huge cavity in the ground was what the giant bomb had left behind. The quartet quietly walked around, avoiding any burning bushes from the explosion, and soon realized that the old fences were blocking their path.

"What the--?!" Patience kicked one of the fences, not exactly expecting it to fall down to her might. "Who builds a bunch of fences in the middle of nowhere like _here_?"

Malevolent laughter resounded through the air, causing the group to simultaneously unsheathe their swords. Too soon the laughter faded out and another giant bomb fell from the air to cause an earthquake as it began to tick down from ten seconds.

"Back down!"

"Our path is blocked, Hope," Patience said, trying to find a way to squeeze around the new bomb to get to the rocky staircase.

"Then we use a new one," Faith spoke up, stomping on a small ember that was burning away a defenseless plant. She chopped up what was left of the plant, and then led the way down the rickety ladder that had been hidden underneath it. Her sisters followed, and as soon as Link joined them, the second bomb exploded above them.

"Hey, there's a path down here!" Link paused in going back up to the surface as he heard Patience's voice from below. Hope, who had been right behind him, gave him a quick glance before following Faith down to the youngest sister. Link wasn't too far behind.

Patience led the way as a second ladder came into view. The group scrambled up the rings and emerged behind one of the fences.

"Another puzzle," Hope mused.

"I'd call it an annoyance," Faith said.

The ground shook once more as a third bomb dropped from the sky, signaling the quartet that the race had begun. The four dashed around, chopping up plants to find more holes and underground passageways to enable them to get to the next area. Two bombs later, the group had managed to find the last pathway behind the farthest fence, and ran into the other clearing as the last explosion echoed around them.

The next few areas seemed easy enough. It was more hide-and-seek with holes and underground passageways while simultaneously attacking various monsters. For a while, the group had even believed that their trouble with giant bombs were over. However, as soon as another lake had appeared before them, one last bomb dropped from the sky onto the tiny island in the middle of the lake and began its countdown.

Faith grimaced as her sisters jumped into the water. Hope glanced back at Faith as Patience dove under the water whenever possible to collect stray Force Gems gathered at the bottom of the lake.

"Faith, it's not that deep," Hope said, half-turning to glance at the bomb. "Come on..." she pleaded.

The middle sister glanced at the bomb -- the countdown was at five seconds -- and waded into the water, noticing that Link was right behind her.

Three seconds...

Hope took a deep breath as she dove under while Patience resurfaced before quickly going back under after spotting the countdown.

Two seconds...

Faith glanced at Link. He was watching her, his eyes making it clear that he was waiting for her to go under, or he would drag her down. With a calming inhale of sweet air, the middle sister let herself sink beneath the liquid.

Powerful ripples ripped through the water as the bomb exploded, beating the group apart as they each spiraled in slow-motion through the lake. A loose stone from the island bolted into the water from the explosion, pummeling Faith in the stomach. Against her will, her mouth opened to suck in needed air, yet only liquid rushed into her lungs making her body weak. Her eyes shot open in a panic at the thought of her nightmare coming true. She spotted her sisters farther away in the water, Hope pulling Patience up to the surface. Faith suddenly felt calm for an instant; if her sisters were okay, then she'd be fine.

A pair of arms suddenly wrapped themselves firmly, yet gently, around Faith's waist, and she let her limp body get pulled to the surface of the water, her head not entirely sure what was happening. Although it seemed like hours had passed while being underwater, it had only been seconds.

"Faith, are you okay?!" an alarmed Hope, with Patience by her side, asked as soon as Faith felt wind caressing her face. The middle sister responded with coughs and gags, trying to get replace the water in her lungs with air.

"I think she will be." Link answered for Faith, and she realized that it was he who had helped her out of the water. In fact, one of his arms was still around her waist. "She just swallowed some water."

"That water...was disgusting!" Faith said when she was able to speak again. "Ugh...!"

Hope sighed, a faint smile on her lips showing relief. If Faith had the strength to give off a sarcastic complaint, then she'd be fine.

Patience apparently thought so too, for the youngest sister looked at the clearing in front of them. A steep, rocky wall enclosed the area, with a set of old stairs climbing up the north side. A barrier of darkness was set up right in front of the stairs. She spotted grass at the top of the plateau, and she craned her neck to see what else...

"Hey, guys, I think there's a village ahead...!"

"I hope there's an inn or something," Hope said immediately. What she wouldn't do for a real bed...

"There should be," Link said, standing up from previously sitting beside Faith on the beach. He glanced down at the middle sister. "Are you okay to continue on...?"

She paused a moment, stared at him as if trying to figure out his motives for being concerned about her, then stood up and casually brushed off the sand from her clothes. "Yeah," she said. "I'm not about to hold you guys up."

Link gave her a crooked-smile as she walked pass him to join her sisters further into the clearing. He figured that her slight nod to him as she passed was her way of expressing thanks, and took it in stride.

"OMIGOD, GIANT-HEADLESS-CLAW-THING!"

"Oof--!" Link was almost knocked the ground as Patience ran into him before scrambling to hide behind him. He blinked at her exclamation, then looked up as Hope and Faith backed up to be closer to them as well.

"How can it SEE?!" Patience asked, her tone a mixture of fear, awe, and disbelief. Link watched as the monster wandered the clearing aimlessly, staying clear from the walls, its four colored claws snapping mechanically. The claws were all the monster was made of, really; they were connected to each other by a small body the color of seaweed.

"It obviously can't hear," Faith said, casting Patience a glance. "Otherwise it'd be on top of us in an instant from your loud mouth." Patience turned her eyes away from the monster only for the second it took her to stick out her tongue at Faith.

"The claws are color-coded," Hope noted. "The same colors as our clothes."

Link gently pried Patience's fingers from the back of his tunic and drew his sword. "Okay, then," he began. "I'll try to destroy the green one first. Stay close to the walls."

"Aye, aye, sir!" Patience saluted and quickly found sanctuary in a niche in the wall. Faith just nodded, while Hope told him to be careful.

Link cautiously crept toward the monster, certain that it could not hear him. He kept moving to keep up with it, spinning around to always have the green claw in sight. The instant that the monster paused, Link struck.

A terrible screech reached the quartet's ears as the green claw shrunk with the painful sound of a rusty hinge trying to turn one last time.

"Link, move!" With poor judgment, Link had tried to block his ears along with instinctively closing his eyes when the screech erupted. Now, however, at Hope's voice, he saw the monster moving toward him with astonishing speed, and rolled out of the way to receive a cut on his upper arm.

Of course, it was better to have the gash on his arm than his head.

The monster whirled past him and toward the sisters. Hope and Patience dashed one way, while Faith went the other. The middle sister had brandished her sword, and leapt toward the monster, the blade glinting dangerously in the sunlight. With an accurate swing, another screech indicated that the red claw had shrunk like its green partner.

If Faith hadn't kept moving, the rapid monster would have gutted her with one of its remaining claws.

"Hope, Patience," she said, making her way toward Link by one of the walls. "You're up!"

The other two were across the clearing, and glanced at each other before Hope silently withdrew her sword. The monster was moving all around the clearing, resembling a ball in a pinball machine. The eldest sister moved away from the wall she had been leaning against and into the middle of the clearing. She stood her ground, seemingly waiting patiently for the monster to come roaring past her.

When it did, she let it have it.

Hope darted back to the side of the clearing as the monster screeched once more, finding herself near Link and Faith. Patience was alone, wide-eyed, across the clearing.

"Come on, Patience, you only need to hit it once!" Link called out to her, praying that the monster, moving faster than ever before, would not hit any of them, especially little Patience. If she just hit the purple claw first, they'd be home-free...

"How?!" the youngest asked, her sword limp in her hand as she tried to watch the monster whirling about. "It's almost a blur!"

"You're the quickest one out of us," Hope said, trying to boost her sister's confidence. "Just swing your sword!"

"Think of all the Force Gems you'll get when it's destroyed!"

Patience blinked at Faith's shout to her, and then turned her attention back to the monster, which seemed to be slowing slightly from not hitting anyone. The youngest of the quartet gulped down her nervousness and tightened her grip on her sword as she crept out from the wall, focusing on the Force Gems like Faith had said.

The monster twirled past her, and she instinctively closed her eyes as the buffeting wind almost knocked her over. Instantly, her sisters and Link all, practically in unison, yelled at her to keep her eyes open. Patience just nodded in their general direction and stared after the monster. With a deep breath, she steadied her sword and ran toward the monster, taking a chance on where the purple claw will be.

"Hiiiiii-YAH!" Slicing her sword in the air, Patience closed her eyes to brace herself for the impact, and paused a moment after her attack. Slowly opening her eyes, she blinked and looked around to notice that the monster was still functioning and moving around at the complete opposite end of the clearing where she was now.

"You've got to be kiddin' me!" The first wave of nervousness behind her, Patience doggedly pursued the monster's purple claw, occasionally yelling at it to stand still. After missing the claw twice more, Patience finally destroyed the monster with her sword. The monster exploded, showering the quartet with many Force Gems.

"You won't have them for that long," Faith said as Patience dashed around to gather the Gems up.

"What do you mean?" Patience asked, her previous cheerful mood starting to slip.

Faith jerked her thumb to gesture behind her shoulder at the barrier of darkness. "Remember those things?" she asked dryly.

Patience sighed, but continued to collect the Gems. "Yeah...but we could always use more Force Fairies, right?"

Faith couldn't argue with that, nor did she try to. Instead, she helped her younger sister gather the Gems before the two joined Link and Hope over by the barrier. They each destroyed one of the spheres and waited not-so-patiently for the Gems to change to Fairies before they eagerly ascended the staircase and toward the village. Each of them wanted the peace and quiet that a civilized village could offer.

However, none of them really believed that their luck would allow them to rest...

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**Krista: **Thanks very much for reading, and review at your leisure to let me know how I'm doing.


	18. Village of the Blue Maiden Pt One

**Krista: **About a year since my last update. I apologize for that, but, unfortunately, fanfiction must take the back seat when one is in college. I thank everyone who continued to give me positive reviews for my story since my previous update, and I hope you all enjoy these next chapters.

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**_Chapter Eighteen: _Village of the Blue Maiden: Part One**

"Village of the Blue Maiden," Patience read off of a small plaque hanging on a tree near the village gates. She blinked. "Wait…That lady-turned-fairy that we saved in the castle? _That_ Blue Maiden?"

"Do you know of any other?" Faith asked dryly. Patience just shrugged before glancing over at Hope.

"And what are you reading?" she asked casually as she slid up beside her eldest sister in an effort to read a sign over Hope's shoulder.

Hope gave a wry shake of her head. "The 'Tingle Times'," she responded.

"The what?" Link joined the two, followed quickly by Faith. "You've got to be kidding me…"

"What's it say, Hope?" Faith asked. "Anything good? Link's big head is in my way." Link would have glared at the middle sister, but Hope's gasp interrupted his actions.

"That's awful!" she said. The other three glanced at each other, all unable to see the 'Tingle Times.'

"Hello?" Faith said, poking her older sister's shoulder. "Care to elaborate?" Hope appeared not to have heard her as she continued to scan the sign while reading to herself. With a sigh, Faith pushed Hope over so she could also see.

"Kids disappearing?" she said skeptically. "That's--HEY!"

"And Balloon-Boy thinks they're ditching school while playing a game," Patience said after she had shoved Faith out of the way. "I would if I could get away with that."

"I doubt they are, though," Faith said, going closer to the village. "Why else would the Blue Maiden have us go this way if there wasn't some sort of trouble she wanted us to solve…? Link must be used to this kind of stuff; I'm sure this isn't his first adventure. Right, Link?"

There was no response. Faith and Hope blinked and looked around until Patience pointed toward the village gates, and there right on the inside of them was Link speaking to Kaepora Gaebora. Faith rolled her eyes, but followed her sisters to the inside of the gates to catch up.

"What'd he say?" Hope asked as they went next to Link and watched the owl fly off.

The Hyulian's eyes were narrowed in thought to accompany the frown that was on his lips. "He spoke of the disappearing villagers," he said as Patience apparently grew bored and wandered around the area. "Kaepora Gaebora thinks that they're being drawn into the Dark World."

"That sounds fun," Faith said, her voice keeping its dry tone. She glanced over at Patience, who had suddenly began giggling behind the perch that the owl had landed on. "What's so funny?"

"I-I don't know," the youngest said, backing up toward her sisters and Link. Her giggles soon died down, and with a deep breath, she added, "That spot over there tickled me!"

Her sisters exchanged doubtful looks. Hope said, "You must be joking. What really caused your giggles?"

"I'm not lying!" Patience protested, her eyes darting to each of the other three's skeptical faces in turn. She walked back toward the spot, pulling Hope along with her. "Seriously, the air tickled me--Hee, hee, hee…!"

The eldest sighed as she followed Patience, but was soon caught under the same spell as the youngest.

"Hope…?" Faith dragged the eldest away from the spot, asking, "Please tell me you have a better explanation as to why you just laughed than Patience's claim…?"

Taking deep breaths to calm herself, Hope shook her head. "I'm afraid not," she said.

"I don't feel a thing," Link said, standing beside the giggling Patience.

"Are you ticklish at all?" Patience asked between fits of laughter, poking the young man in the stomach. His recoil and small smile at the touch gave the sisters a positive answer.

"I can't feel anything either," Faith said, her eyes staring at the ground below her. After an instance, they snapped back up at Patience, and the middle sister pushed the youngest back from the area. "For the love of chocolate, go over there and breathe before you pass out!"

Patience did as she was told, and began to sober up. "Well, discovering the fickle tickling spot was fun! Can we go find some food--"

"Excuse me." An elderly man stood behind Hope and Patience, one of his hands anxiously twisting his white beard around. "Did I hear you correctly? Can you sense the Moon Gates?"

"The what-now?" Patience blinked.

"The Moon Gates," the man repeated. "They are the mystical doors that link our world with the Dark World. Someone opened one recently, and then mages and whirlwinds were brought upon our fair village. My heart leapt at the thought of one of you being able to sense them…"

"Two of us can, actually," Hope said, her smile growing at the excited and relieved expression that she got from the elderly man.

However, that expression faded and a worried frown presented itself on the man's face instead. "But you are all so young…I wouldn't want to place this burden on you--"

"What's one more burden?" Faith asked casually, her fingers tapping on her sword's hilt. "We're tougher than we look. I'm sure we'll be fine."

For a moment, it seemed as if the old man was inwardly wrestling with the decision he had to make. Yet, the idea of regaining the village's peace soon reigned victor.

"Very well." Gingerly, the man reached into one of his overlarge pockets and presented Hope with a gleaming orb swirling with blues and violets with just a hint of goldenrod. "Then take this Moon Pearl and help our village."

"You can count on us," Hope said.

"Oooooo…!" Patience poked the orb, almost causing Hope to drop it and earning herself a glare from the eldest. "I couldn't help it! It's shiny!"

Hope rolled her eyes, and made her way back to the spot that caused her to giggle. Faith and Link moved aside for her, until the orb gave a soft pop and dissipated from her grasp, only to have a glowing circular portal appear.

"Ladies first," Link said, gesturing to the portal.

Faith rolled her eyes while wearing a crooked smile. "Such a gentleman," she said dryly, before being the first to step into the portal. A flash of light enveloped her body, and she was gone.

"Uhh…She _is _okay, right?" Patience said, peering at the portal as if Faith would magically reappear again.

"Of course," Link said easily. "She's right there." The remaining sisters followed to where Link pointed and, sure enough, there was what looked like Faith's shadow moving freely on the ground.

"…The portal makes us invisible? Cool!"

Link's palm connected with his head. "No, Patience…! She's in the Dark World. That's something that Kaepora told me. With these swords, apparently we have the ability to see into the Dark World."

"Which is why we were always able to see Shadow Link run away," Hope added.

Link grinned at her. "Exactly."

One by one, those three stepped into the portal to enter the Dark World.

"Well…This looks boring," was Patience's first remark. "Why is the 'Dark World' brighter than the real one?"

"Maybe for irony?" Faith's voice sounded from the center of the clearing.

Hope looked around warily. "And I have a bad feeling about this place nonetheless…"

"You're not the only one," Link assured her, looking ready to unsheathe his sword.

"What's the problem?" Faith asked, gesturing to a second portal right beside her. "We're returning to the Light World now anyway. There's nothing to do in this little section of the Dark World."

It was true; the area, although seemingly a mirror of the land they just left, appeared to have no land off to the side of it. It was like a floating island with a hazy blank sky over it. Since there was nothing else to do, the quartet returned to the Light World…

…And were greeted with a scream.

"Where'd you come from?!" the woman yelled, staring at the four in wide-eyed alarm and wonder. "Kids aren't supposed to appear out of nowhere! No, around here they just disappear…! Blasted mages…" She left them on that note, shaking her head and muttering about how the Seeker's Guild should get a move on with that case.

"Case?" Patience perked up at that. "It sounds like a secret agent organization!"

"It's not so secret anymore," Faith said. Patience apparently didn't understand Faith's reference to how loud the youngest was, or didn't care.

"Can we go see them?" Patience asked, bouncing down the path in front of Hope and Link. "Please? I wanna be a secret agent!"

With that, the youngest began to hum a James Bond-like theme song, and charged down the path, occasionally rolling here or there and scaring villagers passing by.

"Do you even know where you're going?" Faith called out to her.

Patience halted, then pointed in a seemingly random direction. "That way!" she said eagerly and began rolling once again.

It took the quartet a little while to fully explore the village, with Link, Hope, and Faith taking a few cues from Patience's 'secret agent' idea and asking villagers about their disappearing neighbors. Most looked at the quartet oddly, some even remarking about how their clothes matched (Hope had to restrain Faith from attacking a guy mocking them about it at one point), but they still got some responses about the subject. Almost all of the villagers they spoke to pointed the four in the direction of the Seeker's Guild in the northwest part of town.

"Do we _really_ have to wait in line?" Patience voiced everyone's thoughts as the four stared at the enormous crowd of people standing around in front of one of the buildings in the area.

"We shouldn't have to," Faith murmured, looking around the area.

"I know, we're the heroes!" Patience said. "We should get special little I.D. cards with benefits like being able to cut in lines."

"There should be another way," Faith said, her voice barely a whisper. However, Link's ears caught her statement.

"One of your hunches?" he asked, his voice dry. Faith just glanced at him -- he swore a flicker of uneasiness had flashed through her dark brown eyes for an instant -- before continuing to look around.

"There's a pathway," Hope suddenly said. Link's attention turned to the eldest sister and the other two girls followed suit. Hope's voice dropped, either just so as to not attract the grumbling people in the lines or out of a sudden shyness at having everyone's attention on her. Pointing to the side of the Seeker's Guild's building, she said, "The grass is browner and scarcer over there, as if many people walk on that patch of ground frequently. It looks as if it leads somewhere."

"Well," Patience said cheerfully, "let's go find out!" With that, the youngest was off like a rocket through the crowd of people, and the other three had to hurry to keep her in their sights.

"Slow down," Faith said as the quartet made it to the alleyway beside the building. She took a cautious glance over her shoulder. "We don't want _everyone _finding out about this pathway..."

Patience didn't seem to hear her. Instead, she was watching Hope and Link inspect a large part of the wall that didn't seem to belong.

"It looks like a door," the youngest piped up.

"That it does," Link said easily, frowning at the part of the building. "Except that this doesn't seem to have any handles…"

"Maybe we should knock," Patience said, squeezing herself in between Link and Hope to get close enough to the door.

"Knock?" Link echoed in disbelief as Patience rapped her small knuckles on the door a few times. "I don't think it'll be that--"

The door slid open soundlessly.

"…Easy…" Link shook his head with a shrug at Hope's chuckle and Patience's proud pose. Faith blinked, apparently sharing Link's feelings on the subject, unsure if she should believe it or not. The middle sister didn't say a word, however, as she led the way into the place.

"You have keen eyes to spot our entrance," an older gentleman said as soon as the quartet stepped into the building. He had a bandana wrapped around his head that was dark gray in hue and matched the rest of his monotone outfit. A black patch also covered his left eye.

"I am the Guild Leader, and this is the office of the legendary Seeker's Guild," he said. "We're investigating the sudden appearance of those suspicious mages."

"We heard that you were trying to figure out why the children disappeared," Hope said, obviously more worried for young kids than magic users.

The leader's eye narrowed at her for interrupting, but nodded to her words. "We've reason to believe that the mages are connected to the vanishing children." His eye roamed over the quartet, seemingly studying them while choosing his next words carefully.

"Why are you all dressed alike?"

Link rolled his eyes at the question, and he distinctly heard Hope groan. Patience muttered something about how it wasn't their choice, yet Faith glared at the Guild Leader and retorted, "Why are you dressed like a shipwrecked pirate?"

The Guild Leader seemed taken aback at the question and mumbled something incoherent before clearing his throat. "We're a bit shorthanded at the moment," he said. "Care to help us out?"

"We'd love to," Hope said before any of the other three could speak.

"Excellent," the Guild Leader said. "There's something I need you to do for me right away…"

"Four members of the Seeker's Guild, and four of us," Faith began saying as the quartet exited the building after the Guild Leader gave them the assignment. "Anyone else think it will be quicker if we split up to find one each?"

"Split up?" Hope echoed as they walked toward a semi-secluded spot in the area. "Wouldn't it be safer to stick together?"

"Our swords have stayed in their hilts the entire time we've been here," Faith said, "and I don't expect to have to take mine out for a while yet. The portions of the Dark World we had been in didn't seem to have anything exciting to fight either."

Hope still looked doubtful. "Well…"

"We're all in the same village," Patience pointed out, apparently eager to explore on her own. "And it would be quicker, wouldn't it?"

"Not unless one of you gets lost," the eldest said dryly, making Link suddenly wonder how good Faith's and Patience's sense of directions were. "What do you think?"

Link stopped himself from shrugging as a response to Hope; a shrug wouldn't help them reach a decision any faster! "Well, it is a small village," he ventured to say. "We probably won't be separated for that long. And there are lots of villagers around; if anything was to happen to any of us, I'm sure there would be witnesses."

Hope sighed, her way of admitting defeat after Link's words. "Alright, fine," she said, "but don't go too--" A fit of giggles, accompanied by Patience's own, interrupted Hope.

"Another portal, I'm presuming?" Faith asked as she pulled Patience away from the spot while Link did the same for Hope.

"Duh," Patience said, looking around, after regaining her breath. "Wonder where there's a Moon Orb around here."

"Moon Pearl," Hope said.

"Or one of those too," Patience said easily. "It probably doesn't matter which we use." Before any of the other three could correct the youngest, Patience had bounded toward the other large building in the area, one that had a much shorter line than the Seeker's Guild. Her sisters and Link watched as she chatted with the rather plump lady standing in the doorway, and then vanished into the building when the lady allowed her through. Link was about to voice a question regarding what Patience thought she was doing when the purple-clad girl came darting back to the three, a precious Moon Pearl in her hands.

"I found one!" she said, her smile directed at Faith as if something unspoken was being said between the two. Link idly wondered if Patience was starting to get hunches like the middle sister as the youngest went close enough to the spot to allow the Moon Pearl to vanish and be replaced by a portal to the Dark World. "Let's go!"

Patience disappeared first and Hope was right behind her. Link glanced at the middle sister about to follow.

"Hey…Faith?"

She paused from entering the portal, one foot frozen in mid-step and turned to look at him curiously.

"Why do you think that Hope and Patience can sense the portals but we can't?" Link asked. Faith stepped back from the portal, giving him a lopsided smile.

"Because they're young and innocent," she said with such certainty that he thought it was like one of her 'hunches.'

"You're younger than Hope," the young man pointed out.

Faith scoffed. "What, you think I was calling _Patience_ innocent? No, that's Hope's job. She'd rather have a healing staff than a sword."

Link couldn't tell if he was surprised or not. "Myself I can understand. But you're saying that _you're_ not innocent, Faith?"

She shook her head, a faint, bitter smile on her lips. "Think about it, Hero," she said. "I'm always the one ready for a fight, the one who always has her sword out first. I'd rather do all the killing than let those two get blood on their hands."

Link stared at her, wondering what had happened in her world to make a girl as young as Faith have such an outlook on life. Faith _should _be innocent. Faith should not know what it's like to kill, much less be willing to drive a sword through someone.

There were so many things he didn't know about his companions, so many questions unanswered.

"Are we ready to go now?" Faith's voice interrupted his thoughts, and he forced his eyes to focus back on her. Her head was tilted slightly to the side as she stared at him, puzzled.

Link gave her a crooked smile as he stepped closer to her and the portal. "I shouldn't be so surprised, I suppose, to learn that _you _are not so pure," he said teasingly.

A smirk was all he got as a response before she disappeared into the Dark World.

And as he stepped in after her, he figured that there would be plenty of time to ask all of his questions. After all, the journey seemed to have barely begun.


	19. Village of the Blue Maiden Pt Two

_**Chapter Nineteen: **_**Village of the Blue Maiden: Part Two**

"HEADS UP--Oof!"

As soon as she emerged in the Dark World, Faith jumped at Patience's outburst. Sparing a glance at Link to even _dare_ to snicker at her being startled, she walked up to where Hope was standing beside a young girl, one of the missing children no doubt.

The little girl sighed as she looked at Patience, who was somehow stuck inside a bush. "Uh, you may need a bit more practice with them…"

Patience spit out a leaf. "Ya think?" she said dryly, making her way out of the bush while glaring down at her feet. Crimson boots with a white wing design on the sides now adorned her feet instead of the usual brown pair.

"What did we miss?" Link asked.

"You missed me snagging lots of Force Gems while beating Hope in a race and getting these Pegasus Boots as a prize!" Patience said proudly, revving up to try running again. Within a blink, she blurred past the other three and promptly tripped, somersaulted, and smacked into a tree, earning another disgraced sigh from the little girl.

"Patience, I think the boots are too big," Hope said, her tone indicating that she had hinted at the idea a couple of times before. Patience waved off her comment and began to run around the area, many poor bushes getting run over in the process. The eldest shook her head, then turned to Faith and Link curiously. "What took you two so long?"

"We were just talking," Faith responded carelessly. Hope raised an eyebrow, but didn't say anything more when Link nodded in agreement with Faith's words.

_THUD! _"Ow!"

Patience came walking back to the group carrying the Pegasus Boots, the small socks she had on getting a bit of grime on them from the dirt and grass.

"They are too big," the youngest said with an air of resignation. She handed them over to Link and started putting her own boots on again. "Maybe your feet are big enough."

Link took the boots silently, unsure if Patience's comment had been an insult or if her mouth was running without her thinking. Either way, the Pegasus Boots were a comfortable fit and he did a test run around the area.

"He is so much better at those than you were!" the little girl said to Patience. "And he doesn't even look like a little kid!"

Patience glared at the girl. "It's not my fault I have small feet," she muttered. "Hey, are you calling Link old?"

"Well, no," the girl responded, watching Link's blurry form gracefully avoid the rocks that had been so bent on tripping Patience. "He's just not a young kid. Obviously."

"Do you want to go back home now?" Hope asked the girl gently, not letting Patience respond to the girl's previous comment.

"No way," the girl said, surprising Hope. "It's so much fun here without any adults telling us what to do!"

"Enjoy it while you can," Faith said. "You'll be going home soon enough. Hey, Link--Eep!"

Link laughed at Faith's startled look after he had abruptly stopped right in front of her. "You called?"

"Are you finished playing?" the middle sister asked irritably. "Can we go back to the Light World now?"

"If you wish," Link said, actually walking with the boots on. "I didn't know you wanted to be a secret agent so badly, Faith."

Faith's glare at him turned into a look of puzzlement as Patience giggled. "What, we're in the Dark World, so you start acting like a kid?" she asked.

He shrugged, following Hope to the portal. "Why not? All the other kids get to play."

She didn't respond and shook her head as she returned to the Light World first. Patience followed, then Hope after sharing an amused grin with Link.

"I'm off," Faith announced when everyone was in the Light World once more. "I'll go to the southwest corner of the village to see if any of the Seeker's Guild members are around there."

"I call southeast!" Patience claimed.

"What's so special about the southeast?" Faith asked.

Her sister shrugged. "It was just the other side of what you said, that's all."

Hope rolled her eyes in good humor before saying, "I suppose I'll take northeast. I'll go with Patience as far as we can before splitting up."

"You don't trust me to take care of myself," Patience said, a pout forming on her lips.

"I know you can take care of yourself," Hope said. "I just don't trust you to not destroy someone's garden or something while on your own." Patience looked as if she wanted to argue, but Patience gave her eldest sister a crooked smile instead, silently agreeing with Hope's argument.

"I guess I'll stick around this corner of the village, then," Link said, glancing around at all the villagers mingling about, most still in lines for the two larger buildings of the area. "Be careful, you three."

"We'll be fine," Faith said, brushing off his comment. She then gave the other three a wordless wave and went off on her own.

"You be careful as well," Hope said with a smile to Link, leading an enthusiastic Patience away.

Link watched until the three sisters disappeared among the coming-and-going villagers. When they were out of sight, he suddenly felt lost. When the sisters had first appeared when he pulled the Four Sword out of its pedestal, Link hadn't known what to think. They had such different personalities, clashing with each other and him, that he had wished that the adventure was over before it started. Now, however…

He shook his head and turned around to see if he could find any of the Seeker's Guild members. Vaguely, he wondered what the heck members of the Seeker's Guild looked like; did they all resemble pirates?

As if that was a cue, Link's sharp eyes spotted a head wearing a bandana beyond the line of people still waiting to get into the Seeker's Guild. He couldn't recall any stories of pirates who wore green bandanas, but he wasn't going to complain.

"Excuse me, sir," he said to one of the many men standing in the line. "I was wondering if I could just pass in front of you--"

"No cuts!" the ill-tempered man said, his arms crossed while his body stiffened. "I've been waiting in this line for Goddesses-know-how-long, and I'm not moving!"

"I just want to get to the other side of the line--"

"I said no!"

Link mentally counted to ten to keep calm. "I'm not trying to get in the line, I just want to--"

"Try someone else," the man said. "I'm. Not. Moving."

Link rolled his eyes and did as the man suggested, but no one else seemed to believe the young man when he said that he just wanted to go to the other side of the area. He sighed, glaring at no one in the line in particular while he fidgeted from foot to foot, as if the Pegasus Boots had a mind of their own, wanting him to run. A crooked smile twitched on his lips as he chided himself that it wouldn't be nice to run over the people in line. Besides, most of the people were worried relatives of the missing children.

He glanced at the line, looking for any sort of opening that he may be able to slip through if he ran fast enough. Noticing how tightly packed the line was, another sigh escaped the young man. He began to wonder what would happen if one of the girls came back and tried their luck with the irritable citizens in the line. Hope was always polite; she may be able to just slip through with a nicely-worded request and a well-placed smile. Faith could probably intimidate someone to let her by, while Patience could pull off some adorable pout that would compel someone to move for her.

_And I would never hear the end of it,_ Link thought, shaking his head. He had slain hundreds of monsters and explored dangerous dungeons, yet he couldn't get past a line of citizens?

His felt as if the Pegasus Boots had engines revving up in their soles, and without thinking any more of the consequences, Link charged toward the line of people--

--and came to a stop that Patience would have been proud of. Link got up shakily from his collision with the tree, but his pain had been rewarded. Not only did he make it past the line of people (some of whom were trying to stand up after being knocked over by Link's whirlwind), but a couple of fat Force Gems had fallen out of the tree.

Link pocketed the gems and turned around to notice that the Seeker's Guild member was openly staring at him curiously. Link found that he didn't feel like being embarrassed and walked up to the member.

"Hi," the hero said, ignoring the dubious look from the other man. "The, uh, boss sent me to learn the clues that you found out and report everything back to him."

"How do I know you are a true member of the Seeker's Guild?" the other man asked. "Where's your member bandana?"

"Are you saying my hat isn't good enough?" Link asked, exasperation beginning to set in. "Would threatening to tell all these people who are waiting for your guild to take their cases about your building's true entrance be enough to make you believe me?"

The guild member glanced at the line filled with irritated citizens. "I do have something for the boss," he said. Lowering his voice so only Link could hear, the member said, "A mage whispered to me, 'the six.'"

Link blinked and waited, but when the member failed to elaborate any further, Link asked, "That's _it_?"

"That's what I got," the member said with a shrug. "I'm sure it's connected to the missing children case. Don't you forget it!"

Link's mouth open and closed a few times, his brain racing to figure out how to respond. In the end, he just sighed and muttered, "Right…Thanks…" before shoving his way rather un-hero-like through the line once more. It took him but a few minutes to decide to try to look for the girls rather than wait for them to return.

Going east, Link wandered the village streets, enjoying the normalcy of people going about their businesses. More than once Link almost tripped over a stray cucco, and he even bought a comb at one of the booths in the outdoor market. The absence of children was strange, however, especially since there seemed to be a gloomy air floating above the adults' heads at the children's disappearance.

As Link continued walking, he watched as people bustled past him. He frowned slightly as the crowd seemed to move faster and faster as he went against the traffic flow, and he soon sped up himself to go toward the screams and shouts that he heard as opposed to running away from the sounds like the citizens did. When he got closer, a familiar voice reached his ears.

"All by your lonesome, eh…?" Link scowled and didn't hesitate to unsheathe his sword when he spotted Shadow Link cornering someone by a fence, pinning that someone's hands by her sides.

"I suggest you leave Hope alone." Link, ignoring the gasps and stares of a few of the more nosy citizens, almost growled, his voice dangerous and low as the tip of his sword poised perilously in the middle of Shadow Link's back. Shadow Link stiffened and glanced back at the other male with a glare, but it soon vanished as a grin crossed his face.

"And the hero comes to save the damsel, as always." Shadow Link sounded a bit bored, yet snapped his fingers to make a large green Force Gem appear in the air and narrowly miss Link's head as it fell to the hero's feet. Darkness enveloped Shadow Link, and the dark man teleported a few feet away from Link and Hope, watching as Link stepped closer to the now-relieved girl.

"Now, if the hero is here," Shadow Link said slowly, thoughtfully, "and the younger ones are not, then that must mean they are alone, yes…?" With a laugh as cold as the darkness that he used to warp, Shadow Link disappeared, his shadow in the Dark World dashing away.

Link looked to Hope, about to ask if she was okay, but she only muttered her sisters' names before running toward the southeast. Understanding, Link kept close to the eldest sister as they ran through the crowd.


	20. Village of the Blue Maiden Pt Three

**_Chapter Twenty: _Village of the Blue Maiden: Part Three**

Link almost burst out laughing at the sight of Patience holding her own against Shadow Link while Hope looked about ready to sink to her knees in relief that her youngest sister was fine.

"You want a fight?" Patience was taunting the dark-clad man, apparently enjoying every minute of it. She waved her fire rod threateningly at Shadow Link, a small ember bursting from it to burn down the last of the grass in the area that hadn't turned to ash yet. "Come on, I'm ready!"

Shadow Link's eyes narrowed in a glare at the youngest sister as he sidestepped to avoid the flames. "Just wait," he said, almost hissing like a snake as he threw a Force Gem at Patience. She was immediately distracted and ran to grab it, cuing Link and Hope to go by her side with their swords out.

However, Shadow Link wasn't interested in playing any dirty tricks at the moment. With a cold smirk, he disappeared into the Dark World once more.

"Let's go catch up to Faith," Hope said, and she turned around to head off in the direction that red-clad sister.

"There's no need--HEY!"

"Thank God you're okay!" Faith blinked and looked questioningly at Patience and Link as Hope hugged her.

"Well, yeah," Faith said, pulling away. "Your reaction is confirming that I missed something, like I thought."

"A hunch?" Link asked, his tone almost casual.

Faith gave him a crooked smile and shook her head. "Actually, no, not really. I had found one of the members of the Seeker's Guild -- surprise, surprise, he was dressed in red -- and a Moon Pearl from this creepy mage guy." She tapped the orb that was wrapped in a makeshift pouch that was attached to the side of her belt.

"The mage just gave you it?" Patience asked. When Faith nodded, the youngest rolled her eyes. "It's a giant gem! I certainly wouldn't have just _given_ it away!"

"Well, the mage _did_ thank us for freeing Vaati," Faith said dryly. Continuing on, she said, "Anyway, I wandered around toward the northeast section of the village and spotted another member of the Seeker's Guild, so I thought I would find Hope around somewhere. But there was a lot of people because there seemed to be a commotion, and I caught a glimpse of you two," she pointed at Link and Hope, "running down this way. I had to fight through the crowd to catch up."

"You didn't miss much," Patience said with a nonchalant shrug. "Shadow Link just attacked me, but I fended him off with my fire rod."

Faith's expression turned horrified, her eyes wide. "He what…?"

"He came after me first," Hope said, with a glance and smile at Link. "Link showed up and helped me just in time."

"Y-you two are okay, though?" Faith asked, glancing back and forth between her sisters.

"Yeah, we're fine," Patience responded, her head tilted to the side slightly like a confused puppy at Faith's stuttering.

The middle sister sighed, and muttered, "I'm sorry…"

"For what?" Hope asked, her voice gentle as she put her arms around Faith's shoulders. "It's not your fault Shadow Link showed up."

"I should have known…" Link frowned as his ears caught Faith's words.

"How?" he asked, ignoring the questions about her so-called hunches eating away at his mind. "There is no way that you could have known. Don't blame yourself."

Faith shook her head after seeming a bit startled at Link's words, and murmured once more, "I still should have _known_…"

"Well, you didn't, and that's okay," Hope said briskly after an awkward silence had begun to creep over the quartet. "Let's move on. Did the Seeker's Guild member that you found have any clues?"

Link was actually pleased to see Faith roll her eyes at the question; at least her sarcastic self seemed to be back.

"Beautiful," Faith said.

"It is, isn't it?" Patience grinned, her eyes apparently back on her Fire Rod.

"Not that, you dork," Faith said with a huff. "I meant 'beautiful,' as in that was the idiotic clue that the Seeker's Guild member told me. He ranted about how he thought it was part of some mage's spell or something."

Hope chuckled. "I thought mine was bad," she said. "All I got was 'protect.'"

"I got 'the six,'" Link added dryly.

Patience frowned. "Why did you three get easy ones to remember?" she asked. "I got something about being tied to the town…!"

"What is tied to the town?" Hope asked.

"And which town?" Link added. "This one?"

"I guess so." Patience just shrugged. "The Seeker's Guild dude just said that it, whatever 'it' is, was tied to this town…"

Link blinked, then shrugged himself. "Well, I suppose we should go back to the guild leader and tell him these clues…"

"Hey, before we go, there was a bomb bag in one of the doors over there," Patience spoke up, pointing to an orange-roofed building with four entrances. "Just in case anyone wants it…"

Hope chose to take the bomb bag, and the group set off to return to the northwest part of the village. The quartet had been given a wide berth as they walked back toward the Seeker's Guild hideout; apparently the tale of the shadow person had spread quickly throughout the village. In fact, those citizens who were still waiting in line for the Seeker's Guild turned away from the quartet, allowing the four an easy entrance into the secret door.

"Most perplexing," the guild leader mused, pacing back and forth in front of the quartet. The four had taken seats at the table where a small lunch had been spread. Link and Hope watched the leader, a bit anxious and annoyed at his pacing, while Patience snuck some food off the table. Faith just looked bored.

"What is?" the middle sister snapped. "It's like a fill-in-the-blank. Protect the six beautiful _what_ that are tied to this village?"

The leader glared at her. "I suppose you four have ideas as to the answer?"

"What is your village called?" Faith asked back.

"Village of the Blue Maid--" Realization dawned on the leader's face.

"Bingo," Faith muttered sarcastically under her breath. She ignored Hope's stern look that had been meant to reprimand the middle sister.

"The maidens, of course!" The guild leader's fingers snapped. "It's so simple!" He turned to the four. "Your powers of deduction are truly magnificent! We'll continue to use your findings in our investigation.

"And, as thanks, I'd like to give you something." The leader walked over to one of his cupboards and, before the other three could blink, Patience was by the leader's side.

"I can take it," she said eagerly. She blinked and backed up to the rest of the quartet, however, when she saw what it was. "On second thought, since I'm already holding my Fire Rod, you can give that to Link."

"A shovel…" The young man glared at Patience, whom pretended to not notice his stare, as the four wandered back toward the central area of the village. "What made you think that I wanted to carry this thing?"

"Suck it up and be a man, will ya?" Faith said, a crooked grin playing on her lips. "You really would make one of us ladies lug that thing around? I already have the Moon Pearl, Hope has her bombs… You already look ridiculous enough with three women wearing similar clothes as yours following you. Why not add a shovel in for good measure?"

"I'm sure you'll be able to ditch it somewhere," Hope said.

"Ha!" Patience glanced at the three from a few paces ahead of them, beaming an amused grin. "Did you intend to say that pun?"

Hope rolled her eyes once she understood what she had said. "No, I didn't," she said with an embarrassed shake of her head. "Anyway, as I was saying, the guild leader mentioned the house of pots in the southeastern village, right? There must be something worthwhile hidden around there somewhere."

With a sigh, Link followed the girls down toward the southeast part of the village, and the quartet quickly found the house of pots. Not so quickly did Link dig up a pathway, muttering and growling to himself so much that not even Patience dared to bother him while he was holding the heavy shovel. However, she did laugh when Link almost fell through a pit that he uncovered.

"Are you alright?" Hope asked down the hole after the young man had disappeared.

"Yeah, yeah…!" came the irritated reply after some grumbling about 'stupid shovels.' "You three going to come join me?"

The three girls followed at Link's generous invitation, using the ladder to help them. The quartet quickly got through the short underground area without much difficulty, emerging back into the sunlight in the opposite side of the area behind some hedges. Due to Patience's sudden giggling, Faith allowed her Moon Pearl to dissipate and reveal another portal to the Dark World, which the quartet took immediately.

"Hey, you found this secret world too?" a young girl greeted the four as soon as they appeared in the Dark World. "You'll like it here! It's so much fun with no grown-ups telling us what to do."

"You really don't want to go back home?" Hope asked, disbelief evident in her tone.

"Maybe their parents aren't as nice as ours," Faith mumbled. Hope shot her a withering look, but the young girl apparently hadn't heard the middle sister's words.

"Well," the child said hesitantly, "there is one girl who keeps crying. She's in the orange-roofed house over there. Maybe you can figure out what's wrong with her."

Taking the girl's advice (and partly for lack of anything better to do), Link led the way to the particular house, noting the four entrances that all led to the same room and big, animated green Force Gems, which Patience hunted down enthusiastically and successfully powered up their swords. The young man looked around and eventually spotted a red-haired girl crying softly on the other side of a tall table, a door in the side of the wall taunting the quartet to come and find the entrance.

"Patience, want to play with your Fire Rod?" Faith asked needlessly, going back outside. Her younger sister followed with a bounce in her step, and Link and Hope heard her maniacal laughter before they had fully caught up. As soon as Patience finished burning the small stumps that had been in the way, Faith crept up the alley in between the orange-roofed house and its next door neighbor until she found the door that led the four to the red-head.

"Hey," Hope said softly to the girl, startling the red-head enough to pause in her weeping. The eldest sister smiled gently. "What's wrong? We can help."

With a sniffle, the red-head answered, "My… boyfriend and I had a fight."

"Dump him."

"_Faith!_"

Link blinked at Faith's devilish grin that she wore in response to Patience's reprimand. He wasn't surprised at Faith's reaction, but her younger sister's; it was a bit odd hearing Patience be the one to scold instead of Hope--

"She's can't dump him if he's hot," Patience said with a scoff. Faith rolled her eyes, while Link couldn't help but be a bit amused.

He turned back to the red-head and said, "Ignore those two. Please continue."

"It was my fault for being so stubborn," the girl said, defending her boyfriend. "A-and now… I don't know if I'll ever see him again!" She immediately burst out into tears once more.

"Hey, cut the waterworks!" Faith said. "Look, us four are going to travel back to our world… There anything you want us to give to this guy of yours?"

The red-head quieted, thoughtful for a moment, before frantically searching through her pockets and producing a slightly-wrinkled letter. "Please, take this to him!"

"Don't worry," Hope said soothingly, taking the letter and folding it carefully into her own pocket, "you'll see him again. We promise."

"Why can't we just bring her with us?" Patience asked as the four exited the house. Hope and Link glanced at each other, wondering why they didn't think of it.

"I don't think the portals will allow them to," Faith said, yet her voice was slightly uncertain. "We're the ones with the magic swords… I thought only we would be able to go back and forth through the portals…" She shrugged, apparently allowing the thought to fly from her mind. Patience, however, took that as an acceptable answer and was the first to return to the Light World after waving to the girl who had initially greeted the four.

Once the quartet were back in the Light World, they went to a small clearing south of the portal before going through the underground to get back on the other side of the hedges. In that small clearing, they uncovered some switches and were rewarded with another Moon Pearl when the switches were pressed.

"How can these things keep falling from the sky?" Patience asked as Faith put the pearl in her makeshift pouch. "I mean, who's up there tossing down Force Gems and shiny pearls? Is it a sport to them? 'Let's see how many people I can bonk on the head today!'"

"Are you really complaining?" Faith asked with amusement as they descended back into the underground.

"Well…" Patience trailed off, keeping her mind on climbing ladders before fully responding as the group re-emerged into the sunlight. "I guess not… Only when whoever it is tosses down monsters! Link!"

"Hm?" The young man glanced back at Patience and Faith, amusement at their conversation evident in his blue eyes, from walking a few steps ahead with Hope.

"This is _your _world," Patience said accusingly. "Explain this to me."

Link blinked before sending Hope a mock-glare for her chuckle at him suddenly being dragged into the conversation. "Maybe these are a few effects of having the Four Swords…?"

"So, the Four Sword is helping us…?" Faith asked to clarify, mirth also evident in her tone.

"That doesn't explain the monsters," Patience said.

"The monsters are to help us get stronger," Hope responded confidently. Link gave her a grateful look for answering, seeing as Patience lapsed into another thoughtful silence at the reply.

It didn't last too long.

"What the heck does the boyfriend look like?" she suddenly piped up as the group got to the middle part of the village.

"I think it was the guy who was missing his house," Faith said, looking around. Patience stared at her with a delicately raised eyebrow.

"…Her boyfriend is a guy who lost his _house_?" She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, he's a keeper…!"

"It was probably due to the same thing that made the kids disappear," Link said.

"Oh, so the kids disappear along with one random house?"

"I don't know," Link said exasperatedly, shaking his head. Before Patience could respond, he spotted a forlorn young man standing around an empty lot. "He looks like he fit's the description."

"What a mess," the man was muttering to himself as the quartet caught up to him. "My girlfriend gone, my house vanished…"

"We have a letter from your girlfriend," Faith interrupted, effectively startling the boy. It only took him a moment to take the sight of the four in before taking the letter from Hope with a nod of thanks. He scanned it quickly, sighing in relief as he finished reading the letter.

"Thank the Goddesses that she's okay," he murmured to himself. Looking up at Link and the sisters, he said, "She was taken by a dark force after being attacked by a tornado… That sounds crazy…" He glanced around at the lack of children, at the strange mage that walked by before shaking his head. "You four got this letter from her, right? Can you rescue her? Please, help us!"

"What if we said no?" Faith asked. She smirked as she almost dodged Hope's elbow from ramming her ribs and looked back at the boy. "Of course we'll help, I was just asking…! You wouldn't happen to have anything that could help us with this rescue, would you?"

Hope opened her mouth to reprimand Faith ("_We're not mercenaries who fight for money!"_) but the young man was already fishing through his pockets and soon produced a bright blue and yellow feather.

"Here, this is all I have," he said. "My sweetheart gave it to me for good luck. You'll feel like a bird as you jump around as light as a… well, a feather."

Faith took the feather, handling it with care. "Thank you," she said genuinely, her fingers gently caressing the soft hairs. "I know it will come in handy."

"Seeing as your hunches are always right, I know it will too," Link said dryly. Nodding to the other man, he thanked him as the quartet moved on. Faith didn't reply to Link as she seemingly tried to figure out where to put the feather before settling on sticking it in her hair behind her ear. "So, do your hunches tell us where to go now?"

"Give me a minute," the middle sister mumbled, glancing around the area while avoiding Link's eyes. "Let's try the long house over there." Link just shrugged as Faith began to lead the way to the blue-roofed house.

"I was in there before," Hope said conversationally. "There's a giant chasm in the middle of the floor."

"Great architects they got in Hyrule, eh?" Patience said as the quartet entered, peering down into the chasm before Hope yanked her backwards by her tunic. A high table was to their left, bordering the gap on one side while the wall bordered the gap's right. Across the chasm was a pile of large wine barrels, effectively blocking the back part of the house where a solitary mage could be seen flipping through a book with an irritated air as the pages ruffled and whistled violently in the air by the fingers shoving them by.

Link blinked as a sudden breeze tugged gently on his hat, and he let a crooked smile appear on his face as he saw Faith's delighted expression as she leaped -- _flew_ -- across the chasm due to the mysterious powers of the feather.

"I wanna try!"

"Tough," Faith said to Patience. "I don't want to try tossing the feather back over to you; it may fall into the gap."

"Are you trying to go see that mage?" Hope asked, glancing over to said mage, whom apparently was too absorbed grumbling at his book to notice the four yet. After Faith nodded confirmation, the eldest asked, "Do you think you can jump over those barrels?"

The middle sister hesitated, staring at the imposing pile for a few moments in silence. "No," Faith eventually answered as her head turned toward the table. "But I can jump over this!"

With a hop, she did as she promised and jumped over the high table (cuing Patience to ask why she didn't just do that in the first place) before wandering casually toward the back to apparently talk to the mage. Link shifted in his spot as he waited with the other two sisters.

"So," he said as casually as he could manage, "has Faith always been good at thinking of solutions?"

"What do you mean?" Hope looked at him quizzically.

"He's talking about her 'hunches,'" Patience said, complete with air quotes hovering around the word.

"Oh," Hope muttered, then looked back up at Link with an amused twinkle in her blue eyes. "Are you complaining that she often has an idea of what to do next?"

"No," Link said in a carefully neutral tone. "…More like suspicious."

"You don't trust us?"

Link had to look away from Patience's wide, imploring 'puppy-dog' eyes as she asked that. "As much as I _can _trust you," he said honestly. "I mean… If you were in my shoes--"

"My toes would have a lot of wiggle room."

The young man mock-glared at Patience, but carried on as if she didn't interrupt. "If you were in the same situation as I was when pulling out the Four Sword and three strangers suddenly appeared like you three did… Well, would you trust those strangers right away?"

"I highly doubt that I would ever be in the same situation as you are now," Hope said with a weak smile, "but I can understand what you're saying…

"You'll have to learn to trust us fully soon, though," the eldest added, a wise air around her. "I don't think we'll be able to save your world without trust…"

"As for Faith's hunches," Patience said, glancing up at Hope, "it's a long story."

"One that Faith would be the best teller for, I think," Hope said. "I wouldn't know where to begin it…" Link just nodded slowly, doing his best to understand these sisters as his eyes caught sight of Faith coming back over the high table.

"Would any of you object to me learning magic from this?" the middle sister asked deviously, waving a somewhat battered book.

"Yes," Hope said. "You have a sword; isn't that enough? Are we supposed to do something else with the book?"

"Deliver it to the mage-in-training."

"First we were heroes, then secret agents," Patience said as the four exited the blue-roofed house. "Now we're, like, mail carriers! What gives?!"

"Any idea where this mage-in-training is?" Link asked the sisters, making sure he was directing the question at all three of them as opposed to just Faith and her hunches.

"Well, we still have a Moon Gem!" Before anyone could correct her, Patience took Hope's hand and started walking in a random direction. "Time to find another tickling spot!"

Eventually, the pair did start giggling, and Faith released the Moon Pearl to create another portal snuggled in between the long house and another house that were in the central area. Emerging into the Dark World, the four almost immediately spotted a young girl in mage-like robes. As they walked closer to her, they were bewildered and amused at seeing a miniature house with wings fluttering around her head.

"I think someone's looking for that," Patience said to the young mage, pointing to the flying house.

The girl's head snapped to them, her eyes wide. "…You mean this is someone's house?! Oh, snap! I thought I just conjured it up out of nowhere!"

"And we have your book as well," Faith said, handing the tome over to the girl. "Your teacher wasn't very happy about you losing it…"

The girl rolled her eyes as she took the book back gratefully. "That old grump is never happy, but thanks for returning it to me!" Flipping through the pages, the mage seemed to find what she was looking for and spoke a few words in an unrecognizable language. Once her chant was over, the mini house disappeared with a POOF!

"There we go!" the girl said proudly. "I'm pretty sure that the house is in its rightful place now. Thanks again for bringing me my book!"

"That was probably the quickest time we ever spent in the Dark World," Link said as the quartet returned to the Light World.

"It was kind of nice," Hope mused. "I had hoped that being in this village would be relaxing, but…"

"It was far from relaxing," Faith finished for her. Link silently agreed as he led the way toward the house in the central area that had been returned (at full size, too).

"Let's just make sure that everything is all right in here," the young man said as he knocked on the door.

"A.k.a., let's see if they reward us!" Patience giggled while Hope tried to shush her before the house's owners opened the door.

The quartet were surprised, but pleased, at seeing the girlfriend somehow make it back to the Light World as well to be with her boyfriend. The pair seemed to have made up, resolving to never fight again, and thanked the four profoundly with a fulfilling, early supper. As the four heroes talked with the couple, the boyfriend actually mentioned how their house had an underground segment that led out of the village. Link asked if the four could use it, and was graciously accepted his request.

"That food was _really_ good," Patience said wistfully as she waited for one of Hope's bombs to clear a path for Link, Hope, and herself. Faith, with her special feather, had opted to take a lower route, jumping over small gaps to meet the other three on the other side.

"It was," Link agreed with the same tone over an explosion. With a cheeky grin, he added, "And they _did_ invite us back…"

"And we certainly can't deny their hospitality, can we?" Patience grinned at the young man.

"Of course not," Link said. "It'd be terribly rude of us."

Faith was a bit confused at Hope's chuckling when the other three caught up with her, but she didn't ask; instead, she was just content with knowing that everyone was in better spirits after a good meal, even her own. However, her spirit was soon squashed into a fit of rage when the four emerged back above ground and spotted a dark figure on the outskirts of town.

Before Shadow Link could even taunt the quartet, Faith brandished her sword and entered a fencing match with the enemy, startling him and the other three heroes.

"Missed me that much, eh?" Shadow Link asked cheekily as he parried her attacks. The pair whirled around the area as if doing a special, deadly dance, not allowing either of the other three to join in.

"You attacked my sisters." Faith's whispered words were dripping with venom.

"That's my job, Hon." Shadow Link skillfully dodged her oncoming blow with a wink. He snapped, allowing a few copies of himself to emerge from the shadows to attack the other three. "If you were around, I would have gone straight for you…"

Faith growled, vaguely hearing the sounds of swords clashing (and, out of the corner of her eye, seeing flames eat the grass while chasing a copy of Shadow Link), and jumped over Shadow Link in order to try to do a downward thrust with her sword on his head. He had just barely dodged, but Faith's efforts to puncture his skull was enough to make his copies disappear while his wispy form swirled until he had transformed his tunic into a duplicate of Patience's.

Patience's jaw dropped and she groaned at having to be the one to defeat Shadow Link by herself, but at his taunting gesture, she darted at him with her Fire Rod in one hand and sword in the other. When Shadow Link kept dodging her flames and parrying her sword attacks, the other three stepped into the fight; perhaps they couldn't physically hurt Shadow Link because of his odd magic, but they were certainly able to corral him and block off any other attempts to dodge Patience's attacks.

"Enough!" The big green Force Gem that Shadow Link tossed away from him was enough to make Patience eagerly forget about him. "You know I'll be back…"

The four watched silently as Shadow Link swirled back into the Dark World and run away. A low rumble of thunder sounded in the distance to first break the quiet until cheers could be heard from the village. Glancing behind them, the four caught sight of adults gleefully hugging the children that were reappearing one by one.

"I'm glad they have a happy ending," Hope said, unable to keep a smile off of her face. Patience laughed as she pointed out a few children that didn't look too happy to be squeezed by their parents.

"Faith…?" The middle sister blinked as she turned to Link. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," she said, granting him a crooked smile. "I'm fine. Shadow Link's all talk… Just trying to distract us…"

Link just nodded, unable to have time to respond to her words, for the Blue Maiden in her fairy form flew down to greet the four. "Glad to see that you're alright," he greeted.

"The feeling is mutual," the fairy said, bobbing her head in a nod-like movement. "If you four are up for the task now, I have found the entrance to the Eastern Temple where one of my Sisters is being held."

"We're ready," Link said confidently, his partners waiting for the Blue Maiden to lead the way to the barrier of darkness and to the next Maiden's prison.

* * *

**Krista: **Thank you for reading! Please drop me a review to let me know how I'm doing.


	21. Eastern Temple Pt One

**Krista: **Thanks to everyone for the positive reviews! Enjoy these next few chapters, and review at your leisure!

* * *

**_Chapter Twenty-One_: The Eastern Temple: Part One**

"Why couldn't the Blue Maiden stay with us?" Patience asked as the quartet explored the first room of the Eastern Temple, where another Maiden was supposedly being held.

"It'd be too dangerous for her," Link said, watching the Blue fairy fly off. "The evil in this place is also too strong for her to handle."

"Yeah, imagine if she got captured again," Faith said. "What a pain that would be…"

Hope rolled her eyes at Faith's words, knowing that it would be futile to try to reprimand her sister for her insensitive words; Faith was most likely just being sarcastic, anyway.

"There are switches over here," Patience said from the left side of the room.

"And here," Faith responded from the right.

"Two and two?" Hope asked, glancing back and forth between her sisters.

"I got four over here," the youngest said.

"Ditto," was Faith's reply.

"Well, let's try Patience's switches first," Link said, going over to join the youngest.

"Why hers?" Faith asked, but caught up nonetheless.

With a slight shrug, Link said, "Because I was closer to her than to you, Faith."

Hope chuckled as Faith rolled her eyes at the answer while stepping on one of the switches. An odd sound, one that reminded Hope of a game show when a contestant got the answer wrong, rang through the room, and Patience suddenly yelped at a bomb dropping from the ceiling and landing next to her. The fuse was lit and was quickly being eaten away as more and more bombs fell upon the quartet. Luckily, the four were able to dodge the bombs, watching out for each other, until the deadly rain was done.

"…Shall we try my switches now?" Faith asked, breaking the stunned silence after the bombs. The other three didn't vocally respond; instead, they just followed the middle sister over to the other side of the room. Those switches opened up the door to the next room, and the four immediately drew their swords to attack any evil creatures they may encounter.

"Why aren't they staying still?!" Patience chased after the hopping, skeletal monster.

"Would _you_ stay in place if someone was trying to slay you?" Faith asked, cornering the monster she had been pursuing and dispersing it with a couple of sword slashes.

"Who would want to hurt me?" the youngest asked back as she finally destroyed the creature and collected the Force Gems that appeared after. With a cheeky grin directed at Faith, she said, "I'm too cute!"

Hope just shook her head in amusement at her sisters' conversation while the three followed Link into the next room. The quartet traveled down the corridor on their left, and Hope's walk was halted by Link's hand on her shoulder.

"What's the hold up --?" Faith's words from behind Hope were cut off as giant cannonballs came barreling down the path that the eldest had almost stepped on. "Oh. Right."

Patience pushed her way to the front of the group, placing herself beside Hope to watch the balls roll past them. Her neck craned in an attempt to see down the hole that the balls were disappearing into. "Where are they going? Can we follow?"

"I doubt following the cannonballs will help us find the Maiden," Faith said, her face peeking over Link's shoulder. "I think I see the next corridor past where the balls come out."

"We'll have to go one at a time," Link said, his eyes studying the intervals in between each cannonball. Gently, he pushed the sisters back a step. "I'll go first."

Hope glanced at her sisters, a tad surprised that Faith did not protest, but turned to watch their male companion run and roll out of the cannonballs' way. She felt her stomach twist each time a ball just missed him, but she also giggled with Patience when his hat once again fell off during a roll. He glanced at it fleetingly, and Hope wondered if he was foolish enough to try to get it back. She barely realized the relieved sigh that escaped her when Link made it to the other hallway.

Faith nudged her. "You want to go next?" the middle sister asked. "Or Patience --"

The youngest sister suddenly screamed, startling the other two. Hope turned to Patience, only to whirl around when she noticed Patience staring wide-eyed toward Link. The eldest gasped as she saw Link roll out of the way of a ball after falling b ack onto the cannonballs' pathway. A red snake, hissing, its fangs bared, followed Link, heedless of the cannonballs it was dodging. Another snake was wrapped around the young man's legs.

"To the right, Link!" Hope had jumped at Faith's shout; the eldest was too mesmerized at watching Link try to simultaneously destroy the snakes while avoiding the balls. He took Faith's advice and rolled, not flinching like Hope did when one of the snakes screeched as it was run over by the cannonball that Link just dodged. He ended up on the other side of the pathway in a safe nook, and was able to slash the snake hugging his legs. Link ran back across the path, and the sisters heard another snake screech before a moment a silence.

Link suddenly poked his head around the corridor's corner, giving the girls a sheepish smile, and Hope wasn't sure if she wanted to hug or strangle him. "It's all clear over here! Who's next?"

"You're sure there are no more snakes?" Patience asked hesitantly.

Link chuckled as he ran a hand through his hair. To humor Patience, he glanced behind him. "I'm positive."

To Faith's nudging, Hope took the dangerous path next. She mused over how the challenge wasn't too difficult, but she figured she must have been a bit slower than she thought, for as she got closer to the end of the pathway, Link suddenly pulled her over to him just as an extra-large cannonball passed by.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Fine," Hope responded, feeling slightly flustered as she pulled away from his arms. Link nodded, and turned just in time to catch an airborne Patience.

"I saved your hat!" Patience jammed the article of clothing back on Link's head as he put her down beside Hope.

"Haha, thanks!"

"I dunno…" Faith, apparently unscathed from her turn with the pathway, stepped up beside Link, looking at him critically. "I think I liked the 'hat hair' look rather than the 'squashed hat' style."

Link rolled his eyes. "Very funny," he said dryly, yet his hand did stray to his hat to try to fix it. "Let's keep moving."

He led the way into the temple's next room, only to stumble as he crossed the threshold. Cold laughter reached the quartet's ears.

"Having trouble staying on your feet?" Shadow Link taunted, his hammer twirling easily in his hands. Faith went straight for the dark figure, yet she too fell from his hammer's shockwaves. Patience dashed toward him, with Hope right behind her, and managed to take a stab at Shadow Link. Hope got in a second hit before Shadow Link was able to brandish his hammer again.

"Just give up and give me the Force Gem already!" Patience said. Shadow Link glared at her, seemed to hesitate, then smirked and disappeared.

"Hey!" The youngest chased after the fleeting shadow, stomping her feet in frustration when it was gone. "He's supposed to give us a Force Gem!"

"Forget about it, Patience," Hope said. "We'll find more."

"But he's breaking the rules!" Patience persisted, but allowed Hope to lead her back toward Link and Faith.

Link raised an eyebrow. "That guy has rules?"

"Well," Patience crossed her arms, "he _should_… It should be an unspoken agreement --"

"You can get those big green Force Gems when we figure out how to make the bridge." Faith vaguely pointed to said Force Gems that were floating over the giant gap in the middle of the room. Patience watched the Gems for a moment before nodding to the idea.

"Okay," she said, her voice regaining some spark. "…But we'll _still_ be one hundred Force Gems short because of the jerk-- Oooo, a slingshot!"

Link chuckled as he watched the youngest eagerly grab the weapon that was beside the gap, and he looked closely around the left side of the room. "Hey, girls! While you were talking about Gems, I was over here tripping on switches."

"I blame your big feet-- Oof!" Patience turned and glared at the switch that had tripped her. "I suppose it thinks it's funny disguising itself as a floor tile!"

Her two sisters followed, careful to watch where they stepped, and the four found a switch each to step on simultaneously. The door next to them opened with a _whoosh_, and they entered to meet spikes directly in front of them. Patience spotted a few crystal switches in the distance, and with the help of her slingshot, the switches were hit and the spikes dropped away to reveal the rest of the room resembling a cross-shape with its few hallways. Right in the middle of the room was a black. Link and Faith pushed it forward -- the only direction it _could _be pushed in -- and Link picked the north pathway in an effort to keep moving.

"And there's… nothing," Patience announced, walking further into the large room.

"There must be something in here," Faith said, her eyebrows furrowed in thought. Patience shrugged while Hope and Link followed the two in the middle of the room.

The door suddenly slammed shut. An odd sound, like bells and violins playing different tunes at once, accompanied by a soft chant, echoed. Bright flames erupted and shot straight for the quartet.

"Scatter!" At Link's shout, the sisters willed their legs to move, and the four darted to the sides of the line of fire. Once the flames hit the wall, they burned out, and th eodd music was heard again, yet this time it came from the right side of the room as opposed to the middle.

Faith and Hope were near the source of the music, and they instinctively stiffened to listen closely. The middle sister leaped into action first, swinging her sword right at the spot of the sounds, causing a wizard-like monster to appear. Due to Faith's strike, the wizard spun toward Patience, who struck next. Hope got in the next hit, pleased that she had been quick enough to attack before the monster was able to recreate its chant. Link finished it off with an expert strike of his blade, and a Moon Pearl fell from the ceiling as their reward.

"Is that it?"

"What else do you want to show up, Patience?" Faith asked, her tone teasing and sarcastic while giving Hope her makeshift pouch to carry the Moon Pearl in.

"I was hoping that the bad dude had a Fire Rod on him," Patience responded with a sigh.

"I'm pretty sure that his flames came from his magic spells, not a Fire Rod," Link said with a crooked smile as the group returned to the previous room. The block had somehow returned to the middle of the area.

"Well," Patience said as Link and Faith shoved the block downward to grant the quartet access to the western room, "then he should have dropped his magic book so I can learn how to make fire."

"Yeah, that's all we need." Faith rolled her eyes and walked into the western room.

"What are those things?" Patience asked, pressing herself closer to Hope as one of the two odd monstrosities floating aimlessly around the room bounced closer to the group.

"I… don't know," Link said, side-stepping the other enemy when it came too close.

"They look like spiky flowers," Patience said, carefully following the rest of the group further into the room.

"Flowers made out of metal spheres surrounded by red electricity…?" Faith raised an eyebrow at her little sister. "Right…"

Patience wasn't paying attention to the rest of the group, anyway. While her three companions inspected the holes in the room, the youngest made a beeline for the chests in the middle of the room. She opened the first one, but couldn't get the item out.

"Someone want to help me --?"

"It's a bomb!" Hope yanked Patience away from the ticking chest, and the two fell down one of the floor's holes. Link and Faith leaped down the holes they were closest to as well, narrowly avoiding the explosion.

"Who puts a giant bomb in a-- Hey, more treasure chests!" Patience opened the chest that was right next to Hope and herself, squealing in delight at the big green Force Gem found inside, while ignoring Hope's exasperated sigh. Link and Faith had landed by a chest as well, the former gaining a heart container, refreshing himself from his bout with the snakes, while the latter found a small key.

The quartet returned to the room above, and made it back to the cross room after Patience opened the second treasure chest for another Force Gem. The block, once again, had been moved back into the middle of the room, and this time it was shoved to the east so the quartet had access to the north and south rooms again. The group went south, using Faith's key to unlock the door.

"Lovely…" Hope sighed at seeing another pathway filled with cannonballs cruising down the only corridor that would allow the quartet to continue onward. Link stepped up beside her, peering down at where the balls appeared and the next corridor branching off by the entrance.

"I can go first again, and--"

"Don't be an idiot!" Hope said. Link blinked at her reaction, and she continued hastily. "These roll faster than the ones at the beginning of the temple, and there doesn't seem to be any sort of regular pauses that would let you run in between them safely--"

"Okay, okay…!" Link let out a chuckle, but quickly sobered up. "We'll look around to find an alternate route first… But we may not have a choice."

Hope just nodded to his words and didn't have time to respond. Patience spoke up from behind them, saying, "My slingshot can't reach those switches over the gap by the room's entrance, either. So, that idea's down the drain-- Ha, ha, ha…!"

Faith was wearing a crooked smile on her lips as she pulled her little sister away from the tickling spot. "Hope, you still have the Moon Pearl?"

The eldest sister obliged, allowing the large gem to dissipate while the Dark World's portal appeared. However, instead of allowing all four companions into the Dark World, the portal alternated between glowing green and red.

"Aw, look how pretty the Christmas colors are!" Patience's smile suddenly turned into a frown. "Wait a minute…" Experimentally, she stepped onto the portal, yet wasn't transported into the Dark World. "That's not fair!"

"I don't think it will listen if you try to argue," Faith said.

"Faith and I will figure out a way for you two to follow," Link said. Looking to the middle sister, he said, "Shall we?" Faith just nodded vaguely to the young man before disappearing first.

"Hope, I'm bored."

"Then watch Link's and Faith's shadows," the eldest replied. Patience blinked until she noticed the two shadows gesturing as if they were arguing. Abruptly, the two shadows moved downward and vanished as they walked through the cannonballs and down the previously-inaccessible corridor.

Patience sighed. "Alright, now what?"

"We wait," Hope said, too calm for the fidgety girl. Patience was able to keep quiet for approximately thirty seconds.

"I spy with my little eye…"

"Patience, please--"

"Link and Faith!"

Hope glanced at Patience for an instant before also spotting the shadows' return. She stepped back away from the portal, but Link's shadow didn't go toward it; instead, he went straight for her.

She yelped when she was picked up bridal-style, and she half-expected the invisible man that was holding her to transform into Shadow Link. However, she caught a glimpse of the shadow on the ground, waiting patiently with his arms out as if allowing Hope the time to get comfortable. Gingerly, she reached up to wrap her arms around where his neck _should_ have been. Her aim was true, for as soon as her hold was secure, Invisible Link carried her over the cannonballs while traveling down the balls' pathway. Link only set Hope down once she was safe in the next corridor.

While Link's shadow walked over to the corridor's far corner, Hope glanced around, noticing the barred door to her right and some strange-looking tiles a few feet ahead of her. She turned around, the dull sounds of the balls rolling out of their entrance catching her attention. As she gazed at the cannonballs' pathway, a sudden fit of panic gripped her, and she looked as far as she dared down the pathway to try to catch a glimpse of Patience. To her relief, Patience, whooping in delight, was also being carried over the cannonballs, although her position in the air reminded Hope of a frog in mid-leap.

"I don't suppose you would have rather had a piggyback ride as well?"

Hope glanced up beside her at the now-visible Link and his smirk. "Your method was just fine, thanks," she said with a crooked smile.

"Good to know," he replied, returning the smile. Hope wasn't sure how to respond, and was glad that Patience's arrival saved Hope from answering. Faith's shadow went to the same far corner that Link had gone to and reappeared.

"Faith, that was fun!" Patience laughed. "Can I have another ride?"

"Not if you keep kicking me in the ribs as if I were a horse."

Patience sheepishly grinned and apologized while following Faith to the strange tiles. Hope and Link followed as well, the eldest realizing that the tiles were actually hidden switches as the four stepped on them. When the switches were activated, the barred door opened. Link, followed by an enthusiastic Patience, led the way into the new room.

Hope glanced over at Faith to go next, but was surprised instead to see Faith staring at her. "Something wrong?"

One of Faith's eyebrows slowly raised. "You're blushing," was all she said, and exited into the next room before Hope could respond.


	22. Eastern Temple Pt Two

**_Chapter Twenty-Two_: The Eastern Temple: Part Two**

"Sooo… How do we get back?"

Link glanced at Patience after she voiced the question before staring at the cannonballs once more as they rushed past the quartet. There was no portal on this side of the room, so Faith and he couldn't carry Patience and Hope across again. He looked to Faith, immediately mentally cursing himself for expecting her to automatically know the answer.

However, she did catch his eyes as she finished adjusting her bow and quiver of arrows, acquired from the last room, on her person. The middle sister broke the gaze when she turned to the cannonballs' pathway and stepped closer to it.

"Simple," Faith said in response to Patience's question, watching the balls pass by. As soon as there was a big enough opening in between two balls, Faith slipped in between them, sprinting in time with their rolls. "We run. Really fast!"

Hope looked as if she were on the verge of having a heart attack at seeing her younger sister almost get run over by a cannonball. Patience didn't seem to help by shrugging and following Faith at the earliest opportunity. Link could only shrug when Hope looked at him helplessly. To the young man's "After you" gesture, the eldest sister sighed and mimicked her sisters' actions. Link released the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding when Hope was safely with Faith and Patience. He joined them as soon as he could, only to find Patience opening a treasure chest in between the switches by the room's original entrance; he figured Faith triggered the switches with her arrows.

"Oh, good, a bracelet," Hope said, obviously more pleased than Patience; the youngest just stared at the jewelry with disdain before handing the item to the eldest.

"You can have it, then," Patience said. Hope took it, albeit reluctantly.

"But it halves the damage you take, doesn't it? Don't you want it?"

Hope's words fell on deaf ears, for Patience had gotten up and followed Faith out of the room, back to the cross room, before Hope finished speaking. Link stepped closer to Hope and gently clasped the bracelet around her wrist.

"Patience usually tries to run away and hide, anyway," he said, and Hope rolled her eyes.

"I suppose you're right," she said, a smile flitting along her lips as the pair entered the cross room. The block, which they assumed had been in the middle of the room again, had already been pushed out of the way by Faith and Patience, and the other two jogged to catch up with the younger ladies in the main room with the gap to the east.

"For the love of chocolate, Patience, will you just pick a switch?!"

Link winced at Faith's harsh tone that reached his ears as soon as he and Hope entered the room. Faith was on the right side of the giant gap, and a four small blocks were in front of her like a fence that was separating her form the gap. Alternately, one block would disappear, then reappear while another turned invisible. After a few moments, one block disappeared and stayed that way until Faith shot an arrow through the hole in the fence to let the weapon soar across the gap. Link watched as the other blocks took turns disappearing to allow Faith to shoot more arrows, and after her fourth arrow flew across the gap, a bridge suddenly appeared, covering the chasm.

"Those are my Force Gems!" Patience abruptly emerged from a small room that had been to the left of the chasm and dashed across the bridge to catch the floating Force Gems. Faith came down from her spot and watched with apparently mild interest as Patience chased down the Gems.

"The door at the end of the chasm didn't open, did it?" the middle sister asked, coming to stand near Hope at the beginning of the bridge.

"No." Link shook his head before glancing to the right side of the room. "There's a door over there, too. There must be something to open it."

"Anyone got a match?" Patience asked, catching back up to the group. "There are unlit torches by the door at the end of the bridge and it's dark."

"Maybe the room to the right has something we can use," Hope said while Link and Faith tried to find a trigger to make the door open. Eventually, the door did open, sparking a small argument between Link and Faith over who had accidentally stepped on the hidden switch. They were cut off by Patience ordering them to exterminate the rats on the lower level of the new room. Faith leaped down the small wall (after sticking her tongue out at Link) and began getting rid of the oversized rodents. Link rolled his eyes and joined the middle sister after a few seconds, turning to watch Patience and Hope climb down the wall safely.

"Alright," the young man said once the rodents were vanquished, "do we want to go to the north room or the east room first?"

"Let's go north," Patience said, and the rest didn't find any reason to argue. In the new room, empty pedestals were straight ahead of the group, while long, wide hallways stretched out to the left and right. Another door, barred shut, was at the end of the left hallway, leading south into what Link figured was atop the wall in the previous room.

"Isn't there anything in here?" Hope asked when the four met in the middle of the room after inspecting separate corners of the room.

"Of course there is," Faith said. As if on cue, the door that they had entered abruptly slammed shut and familiar, odd chants echoed around the room.

"I want your magic book!" Before the other three could pinpoint the location of any wizard-like creatures, Patience had darted in a seemingly random direction with her sword flourishing. With a battle cry, the youngest swung her sword and its tip connected with one of the enemies before its spell was completed.

Link's sword was out the instant he heard the strange music, but before he could do anything else, he was suddenly pushed out of a literal line of fire. He vaguely heard Faith say something about watching his surroundings before seeing her team up with Hope against a second wizard, while Patience was chasing after her own.

Music to his left alerted Link to his own danger, and he stopped staring at the sisters in time to roll away from erupting flames eating him. The wizard disappeared and Link stood still, alert, and was able to pinpoint the next spot the enemy would appear with the help of its chants. It was vanquished in mid-syllable. A couple of other cries indicated that the other two creatures were also destroyed. Link didn't bat an eyelash at those cries, yet his stomach twisted when he turned to see Faith leaning against Hope. Judging by the middle sister's scowl, it wasn't by Faith's choice, either.

"…You're limping," Hope was saying as Link drew closer to the pair.

"Well, I _was_ burned," Faith snapped, "but that doesn't mean I can't walk!" She attempted to push away from her older sister, muttering, "I can take care of myself…"

Link was there to catch Faith when she stumbled. Despite her protests, he lowered her to a sitting position, noticing the nasty burn on her right leg. "We'll find a heart container to help heal that--"

"What, I'm just supposed to wait here?!" Before Link could respond to the irritated sister, Patience's voice piped up from the northern end of the room.

"Um…" The other three looked at the youngest to find her carrying a Moon Pearl back to them. "This may be a bad time to say that my bad dude dropped this-- Eep!"

The Moon Pearl suddenly disappeared form her hands when she got to the middle of the room, revealing a neutral, gray portal.

"Faith, you're waiting here." Link didn't giver her a chance to speak; instead, he stood up and went over to the portal, glancing at the other sisters. "Someone else stay, too."

"I don't need a babysitter--!"

"The other come and join me," Link finished saying, speaking over Faith, before vanishing into the portal.

He emerged into a portion of the Dark World that was identical as the room in the Light World, except for the lack of doors. The young man took a quick look around a found a set of four levers hanging on the wall to the right.

"Dude, I wouldn't be surprised if Faith threw her sword at you." Patience caught up to Link's side, and he couldn't resist the urge to roll his eyes at her words.

"She'll get over it," he said, praying to the goddesses that he was right. "I mean, we have to watch out for her if she won't watch out for herself, right?"

Patience blinked up at him as they stopped by the levers. "I guess so," she said. "Hope and Faith never seemed like the types that needed to be taken cared of, though. Faith is the protector against bullies, and Hope is like Mom. I'm like Daddy, the fun one!"

Link chuckled as the pair pulled a couple of the levers out of the wall. "And who did Faith get her stubborn streak from, may I ask?"

"We don't know." Patience frowned at the room when the four pulled-out levers did nothing.

"…Oh." Link wasn't sure how to respond to that; fortunately, Patience was already on her way to the portal, figuring that the levers must have done something in the Light World if they hadn't affected the Dark World. The pair emerged back into the room with the two older sisters, and Link found Hope taking a bomb bag that had appeared on the previously-empty pedestals and Faith giving him the silent treatment.

He sighed inaudibly at Faith pointedly not looking at him while he also took a bomb bag. The quartet then made their way back to the room that had the rats in it, opting to travel into the eastern room, moving a bit slowly due to Faith needing Hope's shoulder to help her walk. At the end of the hallway, there was a small square room, with cannonballs crisscrossing each other's pathways by the room's walls.

"Leave me here," Faith said, moving away from Hope to lean against the corridor's wall. "There should be plenty of things to blow up in that room. Be careful of the balls."

Link glanced at the middle sister, just staring at the wall opposite her, as she slunk down to the floor. Shaking his head to himself, he followed Hope, after she told Patience to wait with Faith, into the square room.

Dividing the room up, Link blew up the cracked walls in the north wall while Hope took the south, both careful to avoid the roaming cannonballs. One of the rooms he uncovered contained a Force Fairy, glad to be set free, while his second room oddly contained some old pots. The third room, however, granted him a heart container.

"Are you going to give that to Faith?" He nearly jumped at Hope suddenly being beside him.

"Of course," he said. "I just pray that it's enough for the burn. Did you find anything useful?"

She nodded as the pair waited for an opening in the line of cannonballs before the room to return to Faith and Patience. "A couple of large Force Gems and a small key."

Once the pair returned to the younger sisters, Link used the heart container on Faith's burn. There was still a bit of scarring on the leg, but she was able to walk without a limp.

"Told ya we'd find one," Link said, but all she did was give him a nod in response before turning to Hope.

"There's a locked door back in the rat room," was all she said before leading the way to said room. Patience trotted after her, but Hope stopped Link from following with a hand on his arm.

"I don't think she's mad at you patronizing her," the eldest said. "It's her stupid pride now. Please forgive her behavior."

Link blinked, musing on the subject for a moment. Seeing Hope's pleading, blue eyes, though, made him give her a crooked smile and say, "Don't worry, there's nothing to forgive. I understand."

Hope beamed at him, and the two went to catch up to the other half of their quartet.

"Oooo… pots!" _Smash!_

The instant Hope unlocked the doors, Patience went to town shattering the rows of pots in front of the group. After a few seconds, she also uncovered a row of foot switches, and the quartet stepped on them in hopes that the spikes at the end of the room would disappear. Their prayer was answered, but an unexpected guest also appeared.

"Whoa…" Patience stared up at the massive cannonball that had caused an earthquake when it dropped in behind them. "Is it growing--?"

Hope jerked Patience to run along behind her as the group went farther down the hallway, smashing and leaping over pots that got in their way. "No, it's chasing us!"

Those words spurred Patience onward, and she almost overtook Hope in their run. "I'm waiting for the Indiana Jones theme to start-- Why are we running to a dead end?!"

"Brace yourselves." As Faith reached the dead end, a trap door opened beneath her, sending her into the dark abyss below. Link heard Hope try to stifle a gasp, but he couldn't allow her fear of heights to give her any second thoughts. Grabbing Hope's free arm, Link pulled both her and Patience after Faith.

"Are you all alright?" Faith asked as soon as the three landed in a heap in front of her.

"I'm fine!" Patience answered perkily.

"Of course you are." Link sat up, wincing slightly. "_I_ broke your fall!"

"And I thank you, Link." Patience gave the young man a gallant bow. Link just shook his head at her antics, and got to his feet slowly, satisfied that he would only have a few bruises from the fall.

Turning to Hope, feeling her arm shake in his grasp, he asked, "Are you okay?" She just nodded, her face crimson, most likely due to the unexpected run, as she pulled away from him.

"Glad you can all move," Faith was looking back up at where the quartet had fallen through, "because we all have to scatter _now_!"

The others darted away as soon as they noticed the giant cannonball following them down the trap door. Link saw Faith and Hope make their way to the northwest section of the room, the former pushing a block out of the way so the pair could take refuge behind the low wall on the room's outskirts.

"Ahhh!"

Link turned toward the scream, seeing Patience at the other end of the room with the cannonball right behind her.

"It's chasing me!" The youngest seemed about to drive herself into a corner. Link made his way over to her, crossing in front of the cannonball in hopes that it would become fixated on him instead.

When it seemed to work, the young man said, "Your sisters are over there!" and pointed vaguely in the direction the other two were in while leading the cannonball away. Patience didn't need to be told twice, dashing away at the earliest opportunity.

Link didn't have time to see if she made it to Hope and Faith; he was too preoccupied not getting run over. After he lapped the room once, he noticed the purple-clad girl behind the fence with her sisters, watching him with wide eyes. On his next round about the room, he sprinted toward the three sisters. Right as he was about to reach the trio, Link unceremoniously tripped on air particles.

Before the cannonball could crush Link, he was abruptly hauled to his feet and yanked behind the fence. The cannonball collided with the fence, vibrating the entire room, and continued to try to roll them over, but the fence held on, refusing to let it pass.

"Thanks." Link looked up along the arm that had tugged him to safety, meeting Faith's face. She just gave him a curt nod, not meeting his gaze, before leading the way up the set of stairs in the corner of the room. Link mentally sighed while smiling at Hope's worried look to pretend he was okay, and allowing the other two sisters to go upstairs first.

The quartet emerged into a smaller room that led into a rectangular room whose walls were full of cracked and ivy-covered walls. One of Hope's bombs revealed a similar room with a lantern held hostage behind a fence of immovable blocks. Behind the lantern, however, an entrance was clearly visible. Thus, the four continued to slash ivy and blow up walls throughout the maze of rooms in an attempt to obtain the common lantern. Despite the few times when Faith and Patience (the ivy-slashers) got separated from Hope and Link (whom blew up the walls), the quartet kept moving without too much trouble. Even when they were split up, it was easy to follow the sounds of explosions, and Patience's loud musings as to where Hope and Link went, to find one another again.

Eventually, the four were able to reach the lantern, and Patience eagerly replaced her slingshot with it. Once the quartet got out of the maze-like group of rooms, the youngest immediately lit the torches in the smaller room.

"Isn't the power of fire amazing?" she asked after two big green Force Gems fell from the ceiling, and a shortcut back to the room that had the rats emerged, due to the lit torches. The other three didn't know how to respond; any of them could have easily launched into a lecture on how dangerous fire was, yet none of them could deny the appreciated gifts from above because of the flames. So they stayed silent as Patience lit the way back to the room with the gap.

"I told you guys that we needed matches," the youngest said after the door beyond the new bridge opened once its torches were lit.

"I don't think we would have spent all that time trying to get the lamp if we hadn't agreed with you," Faith said as the four emerged into the new room.

Patience didn't respond, for her eyes were too focused on the many Force Gems resting in the three small alcoves of the new room. "Oooo, look how shiny they are! Can I pick them up? I want to get them--"

"Alright, alright." Link's tone was a cross between exasperation and amusement. "Go ahead; we're not stopping you."

She was off before he finished speaking.

Patience apparently chose to get the smaller-valued Force Gems first, taking the small red ones and big blue Gems before moving onto the middle alcove to snatch the big red Force Gem. However, as she was reaching it, a trap door opened beneath her and sent the girl tumbling down.

"Patience?!" Hope was the first over to the edge of the trap door.

"Don't worry!" Patience's voice, although a bit muffled, reached the other three's ears. "The Force Gems are fine!"

"Yes, of course, because that's exactly what I was worried about," Hope muttered under her breath.

"Heads up, Patience!" Faith stepped atop the door, and Link and Hope heard a short-lived, startled scream from the Patience as the middle sister fell. Link swore the next few sounds that Hope and he heard were the beginnings of an arguments; he thought Patience accused Faith of trying to flatten the youngest, but he didn't dwell on it for too long. Instead, he turned to Hope.

"Shall I pull you along again?" he asked.

"And give me another heart attack?" she shot back.

"How long are we going to wait up here, then?" Link crossed his arms and leaned against the wall, giving Hope a crooked smile. It faltered, however, when she suddenly looked about to panic.

"You don't think they'll be able to come back up here?" she asked.

He blinked and took a quick look around before answering, "I don't think there's any other way for us to go but down--"

"Are you two coming down or what?!" Faith's voice, loud and clear despite having a floor separate them, made Link stumble and almost fall into the trap door. Rather pointlessly, Link looked back at Hope and gestured to the door.

"After you," he said. She glanced at him uneasily before hesitantly holding his arm.

"My legs won't move," she muttered. "Pull away."

Link, instead of allowing her hand to remain where it was, moved his arm to around her waist to hold her more securely. Without giving her any warning, he pulled the two of them over the door, and they fell together. Once the pair was almost to the bottom, Link tucked their bodies into a roll to avoid getting hurt upon impacting the floor.

"So, _that's _what took you two so long." Link glanced over at Patience when she spoke, confused at her grin and a bit startled at Faith's annoyed expression, while he helped Hope to her feet, nodding to her murmured thanks.

Faith's eyebrow slowly rose at the pair and she didn't even turn to Patience as the middle sister asked, "What do you mean?"

"They were trying to imitate a Batman roll," Patience said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "It wasn't too bad. It would have been cooler if Link had a cape, though."

Faith blinked and looked at her younger sister with some of the confusion that Link felt, but Patience was skipping toward the large block that was obstructing the quartet's way. Link looked at Hope, whom just waved off his questioning glance, signaling that he wasn't to worry about the new terms he just learned.

The four pushed the block out of the way together, allowing them access back upstairs into a hallway that would have been a dead-end if not for their bombs. Emerging through the new entrance, they descended down some ladders into a cave. The group moved along quickly, only a Keese here and there the only things that bothered them. Patience did find a treasure chest, but since it was just a key, she passed it to Hope. At the end of the tunnel, the four climbed up another ladder to return to the temple.

Explosions set their senses on fire the instant they entered the room. Link coughed, blocking the entrance to shield the girls, and a cold laugh reached his ears. His sword was out of its sheathe immediately, yet when the smoke cleared, all that met Link's eyes was a room with a northern door and the walls outlined with rows of bomb flowers.

"Link…?" The young man warily moved aside so the sisters could come in. Hope took a quick look around before eyeing his unsheathed sword. "What happened?"

"I heard Shadow Link," he said. "He seems to be gone now, though…"

"Did he plant all these?" Patience seemed to be contemplating whether or not to poke one of the bomb flowers.

"Don't know, don't care." Link tried to peer through the northern door without upsetting the bomb flowers in front of it. "Any ideas on how to get through this?"

Patience raised her hand.

"Ideas that _don't_ involve us getting blown up?" Hope asked.

The youngest's hand slowly went down. "So, human sacrifices are out?"

Link didn't even want to know which of them Patience had intended to 'sacrifice.' Yes, he was sure any of the Force Fairies they had set free would return in an instant to help if they sensed any of the four dying, but… He shook his head, driving the thought out of his mind.

"Light a bomb."

His eyes snapped to Faith. "…What?"

"Light a bomb," she repeated, "and set it by the others. It'll set off a messy chain reaction, but we should be able to get through before the bombs regrow."

Without a better idea, Link tried it. Setting one of his own bombs, he dashed back to the middle of the room with the sisters, just out of reach of the explosions. Immediately after the bombs detonated, they raced blindly through the smoke toward the door, each holding onto another so they wouldn't get separated.

"Let's never do that again," Hope said once the quartet caught their breaths in the next room.

"I agree," Link said, his tone dry as he exterminated a rat that had gotten too close.

"We've already done something like that," Patience said brightly. "Remember when we burned down the castle's throne room?"

"I believe you mean," Faith said with a small chuckle," when _you_ burned down the throne room."

Link shook his head at Patience pondering on the memory before she started to laugh and agree. Her laughing ceased when Hope used the key on a large treasure chest to gain an enormous gem worth one thousand Force, effectively powering up their swords. Patience pouted as the group moved into the next room, but jumped and let out a startled yelp when the door slammed shut behind them.

The quartet moved cautiously forward noting that the ordinary room meant that something unordinary was going to happen. The room was huge, the floor littered with rocks while a bigger stone was embedded in the middle of the room. A few holes were scattered about as well.

Sidestepping one of those holes, Link nudged a good-sized rock with his foot. "Think we have to blow these up--?"

"Look out!" Link stumbled backwards at Hope's warning just as the rock he had nudged… opened its eye?

While that rock, and several others, stared at the girls and him as they floated upwards to hover in the air, the quartet huddled together. The large stone made the room tremble when it raised itself, glaring at the four with an angry, bloodshot eye.

"Time to rock and roll!" The other three turned to Patience with skeptical looks and raised eyebrows. She shrugged, and no one else could say anything; the rocks were ready to play, whether the quartet was or not.


	23. Not a Game

_**Chapter Twenty-Three**_**: Not a Game**

Her fingers drummed the table with no particular rhythm, yet the flames cackling in the fireplace danced anyway. She abruptly stopped her music, one of her hands reaching down to gently rub the very-real scars from her burn on her leg.

Just one particular reason why she should tell him.

Many others filled her head: Patience gaining that cut on her arm due to Phantom Ganon atop Hyrule Castle; Hope almost getting knocked out due to Stone Arrghus sending one of its smaller rocks to her gut; Faith herself getting burned at the Eastern Temple, almost drowning by the coast…

She involuntarily shuddered at that horrific memory before her mind mentioned that it had been Link who had helped the sisters in each of those cases. It had been Link who had wrapped up Patience's cut until the Blue Maiden could heal it, Link who had jumped to Hope's defense when she had been down.

He had been by Hope's side before Faith could get there…

She glared at the Village of the Blue Maiden's Inn's fireplace, yet all it did was remind her that it had been Link who had found the heart container that healed the worst of her burns. The Yellow Maiden, after being freed from her own crystal prison, had done her best to get rid of the scars, at _Link's _asking, but the minor ones remained. Not that Faith ever minded a couple of scars; it was the idea of trying to explain it to their parents once they returned to their world that Faith minded.

Yet, to get back to their world, Faith and her sisters needed to help Link with his quest (at least, Faith figured that the girls would return home as soon as Link returned the Four Sword to its pedestal). And, to work together, especially as the dangers mounted higher and higher, the four must trust each other.

Faith and her sisters didn't need any help in that department; they trusted each other without question. Link also didn't seem to have any problem watching sweet Hope's and young Patience's backs, and the feeling seemed to be mutual.

No; it was just stubborn Faith that was the problem. Despite how much she admired the video game version of Link, he was still a stranger in person, and she hadn't trusted him enough, not with herself, and definitely not with her sisters. However, he'd done nothing but prove his worth throughout all this time, putting up with her mulish tendencies and sharp words. She knew, though, that he didn't fully trust her, the most likely reason being her so-called hunches.

"Where _is_ he, anyway?" Faith growled under her breath as she glanced at the clock. It had been a half hour since her sisters and herself returned from the women's bathhouse; what was taking Link so long--

"Finally…!" She raised a slight eyebrow at the button-down shirt that the inn had given Link to borrow for the night while their tunics were cleaned being only half-done. The young man paused at the doorway, apparently surprised at seeing Faith there.

"Sorry," he said, sounding more confused than apologetic. "Were you waiting for me?"

Faith bit back a sarcastic retort. Instead, she said, "Yes, I was." She gestured to the seat across from her as an invitation. "I need to talk to you. Hope and Patience figured that it would be best if we spoke alone… That, and Patience almost fell asleep in the bathhouse…"

Link chuckled slightly while he sat down and fumbled to finish buttoning his shirt. "Well, I'm up for talking, although I'm curious as to when you decided to talk to me again."

That threw Faith for a loop. "…Huh?"

"In the temple?" It was Link's turn to raise an eyebrow. "After I told you to rest when you got your burn? You didn't talk to me throughout the rest of the temple."

"…I wasn't trying to not talk to you," Faith said. "Yeah, I was a little ticked off at first, but… I knew I couldn't even walk on my own, and that you were right." The slight smirk crawling up Link's face made Faith think about giving him the silent treatment, but she forced herself to say, "I spent most of that time trying to figure out if I should tell you about my hunches or not."

Link snapped to attention, his eyes locked on hers. She took a deep breath, saying, "In the bathhouse, Hope and Patience told me about your questions during the time we were running around this village, and I think I figured out a way to explain my hunches to you.

"Obviously we're not from this world," Faith said. Link nodded, and she continued. "See, on our world, there are these stories, and lots of kids, and adults, actually, act out these stories as games. There's this huge series called 'The Legend of Zelda.'"

Link's eyes narrowed slightly, but Faith didn't give him time to speak. "This whole adventure that we're on right now is one of those stories. It's called 'Four Swords Adventure,' and I've play-- I mean, I've _read_ it through its entirety twice. I started it over with Hope and Patience fairly recently, and then we ended up here during the middle of it."

"So, you know pretty much what is going to happen?" he asked.

"Well, sort of," she said. "I've realized that I can't guarantee that my hunches will be right all the time."

Faith allowed the new knowledge to sink into Link's head for a few minutes. He leaned back in his chair, apparently mulling over what she told him, until he looked back at her. "Why did it take you so long to tell me?"

"I didn't trust you," she said bluntly.

"And you do now?"

"I'm trying to," she said. "Otherwise my sisters and I may never get home, may not… live through this journey if I can't trust you to help watch their backs."

"That's your motivation for everything, isn't it?" Link's tone told Faith that it was a rhetorical question, so she stayed silent, just gazing at him. He seemed a bit downcast at that revelation, but a crooked smile snaked up his face. "But aren't you a fan of me? Seeing as you've read the story a couple of times."

Faith returned the smirk. "Don't flatter yourself."

Link chuckled, and the two fell into an unexpectedly comfortable silence, just listening to the fireplace crackle and pop. Faith ignored his frequent glances at her, figuring that he was just trying to sort out his thoughts. Eventually, she looked at the clock again, and her chair scraped the floor as she pulled away from the table.

"Might as well get to bed," she said, heading for the inn's stairs. "Are you going to your room?"

"Yeah, yeah…" His voice was distant, making her pause. "Faith, wait…" She didn't move, and he stood up. "Is… Is there anything that will make you three want to stay…?"

She blinked, and mentally tried to undo the knot that her stomach had suddenly twisted itself into. "You mean in Hyrule?"

Link nodded, walking closer. "Yeah…"

Faith backed away, beginning to climb the stairs, shaking her head. "No," she said, knowing what a slap in the face that would be to their parents. "I'm afraid there's nothing."

Link sighed, but nodded once more. "I didn't think so… Thank you, Faith. Good night."

She murmured in kind, but otherwise didn't respond.


End file.
